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VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO - DALLAS 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 



VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 



BY 
DAVID SNEDDEN 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1920 

All rights reser-vid 



ip 



.5^ 



Copyright, 1920, 
By the MACMILLAN COMPANY. 



Set up and electrotyped. Published June, igao. 



J. S. Gushing Co. — Berwick & Smith Co. 
Norwood, Maes,, U.S.A. 



^CI.A5?1481 
M 30 tS2G 



/ 



^^7 



a 



TO 

G. S. 



PREFACE 

This book is devoted primarily to a discussion of current 
problems in vocational education. Space has not been given 
either to historical surveys or to descriptions of contemporary 
achievements. Vocational education as a conscious social 
enterprise constitutes, except in professional fields, a long 
new chapter in social and educational evolution. Its litera- 
ture is still largely a literature of aspirations, of shadowy 
ideals, and of scattered and poorly supported experiments. 

But the great social movements of our time have finally 
brought to us unmistakable demands for democratic and 
efficient systems of vocational education. Heretofore such 
school vocational education as we have had has been aristo- 
cratic — "for the leaders" it was claimed; and non-school 
vocational education has been haphazard, unorganized, and 
deplorably lacking in efficiency. 

What we call the ''contemporary movement for vocational 
education" is in stark simpHcity the result of an enormous 
social demand for schools for the vocational education of 
the rank and file of workers. Schools of professional educa- 
tion for the training of leaders we have long had ; but corporate 
effort has, until almost yesterday, balked at the problem of 
providing training schools for workers who toil in the unexalted 
callings of mine, farm, forest, shop, factory, shipboard, and 
home. 

Hence the new movement must first of all be interpreted 
as an expansion — and a tremendous one — of the purposes 
of education by means of those specialized agencies which we 
collectively designate as schools. It may be that to the 
philosopher the shadowy ultimate objectives of education 

vii 



viii Preface 

can be expressed by such " omnibus " terms as salvation, 
grace, moral perfection, physical fitness, social efiiciency, the 
self-realization of the individual, the strong servant of the 
commonwealth, and those other interchangeable terms which 
constitute the currency of vague, speculative thinking ; but 
the age is demanding more specific and more objective inter- 
pretations of the ends we seek. 

As we endeavor to translate aspirations into concrete 
ideals and working programs endless problems arise. Some 
of these are problems of meaning; what, after all, do we 
actually mean and intend by vocational education? Under 
what conditions and to what extent is it different from non- 
vocational education ? Some are problems of aim ; is society 
expected to provide schools for all possible forms of vocational 
education? In the case of any given vocation what are de- 
sirable limits to school directed training, instruction, and 
idealization? Then there are fundamental problems of 
method and of administration; having once determined 
what we seek, how shall we proceed to reach our- goals ? 

As far as practicable, therefore, the writer has addressed 
his efforts primarily to analysis of these problems. He has 
dehberately minimized or omitted discussions of those matters 
as to which substantial agreements seem to have been reached. 
Critical readers may feel that he has over-emphasized con- 
troversial issues ; but the writer has believed such emphasis 
desirable at this time. In dealing with these issues he has 
usually had two distinct ends in view; first, to analyze the 
essential factors of the problem; and, second, to state his 
own hypothetical surmises and conclusions. 

There can be no helpful vocational education that does 
not rest on a sound system of economics. The painful years 
are showing us how Httle legislators, business men, labor 
leaders, and educators know of the enduring laws of eco- 
nomics and how, out of the soil of this ignorance, rank poison- 
ous plants of fantastic creed and malevolent purpose may 



Preface ix 

easily grow. The ignorance of the citizenry of to-day, con- 
fronted by the endless economic problems produced by 
modern conditions of production, is comparable to that of 
the primitive natives in Mediterranean countries and later 
in North America when the currents of commerce sowed wide 
the seeds of the bubonic and other plagues. But there are 
few current economic problems which do not intimately affect, 
and are not intimately affected by, vocational education. 
Man must produce economic goods if he is to live ; he must 
produce them well and efhciently if he is to live well and 
efhciently ; and he must be trained long and exactingly if he 
is to produce efhciently. As far as present conditions of 
thought permit, the writer has tried to hold up for con- 
sideration in the background the most pertinent of the eco- 
nomic problems underlying vocational education. 

The conditions under which this book has been written 
have rendered unavoidable a few major, and a larger number 
of minor, repetitions. But it is expected that a considerable 
number of readers will not desire to follow the text as a whole, 
but instead, to study sections dealing with particular prob- 
lems. For them the repetition of certain fundamental con- 
siderations may prove an advantage. The indulgence of the 
reader is asked also in the matter of bibhographical references. 
Of substantial bibliographical material in book form voca- 
tional education has Httle indeed. The bibliographies Hsted 
on pp. 513-14 are largely of articles and other materials of a 
more or less transient nature. 

David Snedden. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAOB 

I. The Meaning of Vocational Education . . . i 

II. The Social Need eor Better Vocational Education 30 

III. The Relation of General to Vocational Education 71 

IV. Principles of Method in Vocational Education . 105 
V. Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 144 

VI. Commercial Education igo 

VII. Industrial Education 204 

VIII. Vocational Homemaking Education . . . .231 

IX. Professional Education 272 

X. The Administration of Vocational Education . 282 

XL The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools. 352 

XII. Special Problems of Vocational Education . . 369 

yxill. Some Future Problems . . . . . . . 389 

XIV. Probable Economic Future of American Women . 411 

XV. The Practical Arts in General Education . . 455 

XVI, Bibliographies 513 

Appendix A. Occupational Statistics ..... 515 

Appendix B. Terminology of Vocational Education . . 534 



VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 

CHAPTER T 

THE MEANING OF VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 

I 

Some Definitions Illustrated. — For the purposes of this 
book, the word " vocation " will be taken in the sense of 
" calling," '' chief occupation," or primary " gainful pur- 
suit." It can be assumed that every adult in possession of 
his natural powers renders to the world some form of serv- 
ice, in return for which he receives the services (or the 
products of the service) of others. To the rendering of this 
service, each adult usually devotes definite portions of his 
time and energy. He tills the soil, weaves cloth, keeps 
books, commands soldiers, teaches, writes poetry, drives a 
locomotive, superintends a factory, digs coal, heals the sick, 
cleans the streets, or keeps a home. For the services thus 
rendered steadily in the one or the other of these fields his 
fellows pay him with portions of the results of their service, 
money, of course, serving only as a convenient measure and 
means of making such payment.^ 

1 The man who lives by purely predatory activities exacts goods from 
others without rendering an equivalent; but such conduct is, of course, 
under the ban of society. So is beggary and other forms of getting, 
without giving, service. 

A man who owns capital and keeps it invested is thereby rendering a 
service to society, since most forms of production require capital. But 
a man owning much capital may elect to render no other service except 



2 Vocational Education 

Any adult may have other occupations besides his voca- 
tion; but, commonly, he does not pursue these as ^>rimary 
means of obtaining a livelihood, or of producing sufficient 
" goods " wherewith he can purchase what he desires of 
the goods produced by others. These " side " occupations 
or avocations he may pursue for amusement, — they con- 
stitute often the play of men; or he may pursue them as a 
means of health; or he may discharge through them those 
non- vocational obligations which he owes to society, — that 
is, to the family, the church, the party, the state, the nation, 
— as parent, citizen, worshiper, defender. But in no case 
are these activities properly vocations; etymologically and 
logically they are avocations — to be pursued outside the 
hours customarily dedicated to his vocation. Hence, it is 
not consistent with the usage accepted in this book to 
speak of parenthood or citizenship or military reserve serv- 
ice or amateur sport as " vocations." 

Kinds of Vocations. — Vocations, of course, may be 
manual or intellectual; the worker may be called chiefly 
to lead and to give orders, or to follow and to take orders. 

through keeping his capital in active use. For convenience we may 
assume that his vocation is that of " investor." 

In superficial writing it is sometimes assumed that only " labor " 
(meaning thereby manual labor) is productive. This, of course, is 
playing with words. For our purposes, any human effort that results in 
" goods " valued for human utilization will be called productive service. 
Hence the soldier who defends the flag, the artist who paints an at- 
tractive scene, the explorer who reveals new regions, the enterpriser (or 
entrepreneur) who dares to start a new enterprise, the actor who enter- 
tains, the mother who gives her best effort to rearing children, and the 
banker who creates storage reservoirs and " canal " systems whereby 
capital can be gathered and set to work like irrigating water, are all 
contributing productive service no less than the farmer, the miner, and 
the factory operative. 

In the sense used here children, as well as decrepit and defective 
adults, do not render productive service. They may, by their growth or 
presence, add to the spiritual wealth of the community, but they do not 
have, usually, productive vocations and they therefore consume but do 
not add to economic wealth. 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 





i, due toC practice arid expefiell| 
:3e added the equally important grojvth in vocatioi 
due Vj the worker's gradual absorption of the storeli and 
:ommunicated results of the experience of others — fore- 
runners as well as contemporaries. It is in this respect 
Deculiarly that, in the exercise of productive activities, man 
50 immeasurably surpasses the animals. The success of 
he animal in the natural state depends upon inherited pow- 
Ts and individual experience alone, including instincts of 
:ooperation, while the success of human beings is achieved 
argely upon the basis of the individual experience of 
mcounted numbers of others, communicated by language 
md otherwise. Back of nearly every vocation as carried 
m to-day, is a vast social inheritance of discoveries, tested 
levices, organized technical knowledge, and methods of 
:oordinating the efforts of many. 

The Acquisition of the Social Inheritance belonging to any 
vocation may be, for a given individual, an unsystematized 
,nd accidental matter, of it may be definitely organized and 
regulated. Certain instincts, powerful in youth, and prob- 
,bly never wholly dormant, — curiosity, imitation, owner- 
hip, workmanship, competition for approval or ascen- 
lancy, as we may roughly name some of them, — impel the 
v'orker to glean from all his associates and from the prod- 
ucts of human effort which surround him, the available 
ragments of the social inheritance of vocational devices, 
ustoms, knowledges, and ideals. In more advanced stages 
e finds these compacted in books, models, diagrams, for- 
lulae, and the like. 

The process of appropriating the social inheritance pecu- 
iar to a given vocation may consist, so far as a given 
earner is concerned, largely of the accidental or partial 
earning which takes pldce as an accompaniment to actual 
participation in work itself, in progression from its more 
lementary to its more advanced stages ; or it may be highly 



5 Vocational Education 

organized for a definite period. In the first case, the per- 
son (usually youth or young worker) is primarily engaged 
in prodvictive work, and as a kind of by-product of that 
he accumulates, in addition to the results, which are due 
solely to his own enlarging experience, a large body of 
knowledge, devices, " tricks of the trade," etc. from his 
fellows and directors. In the second case, he is primarily 
engaged in learning how to become productive, his produc- 
tive work being for the present a secondary consideration. 
There was a time when a boy became a physician by serving 
as an apprentice to a practitioner. Almost from the outset, 
the novice was expected primarily to make himself useful 
— to assist the healer; but, as a secondary object of both 
master and apprentice, he was expected to learn from the 
elder the " arts of healing," the secrets of materia medica. 
To-day, in the cab of the locomotive engineer, is found a 
helper whose chief duty is to feed the fires, but who is 
expected incidentally to learn the arts and to acquire the 
skill required to later become himself a locomotive en- 
gineer. 

Direct Vocational Education for the Professions 

Society has in large part substituted direct vocational edu- 
cation for the indirect education (by-education) of appren- 
ticeship in the training of the physician; but it has done 
nothing of the kind yet in the training of the locomotive 
engineer. The youth, aspiring to the practice of medicine, 
now spends several years with the one object of mastering 
the accumulated knowledge and the arts of his proposed 
profession. He may, as interne in a hospital, still serve a 
period of quasi-apprenticeship ; but he does so only after 
he has equipped himself substantially to the point where 
he could enter upon productive work on his own account. 
It is clearly within the bounds of possibility that the loco- 
motive engineer will yet be educated directly for his calling 
in specially equipped and staffed schools, as are physicians, 
or in a more nearly related field, chauffeurs, to-day. 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 7 

The foregoing review of some of the more elementary 
facts of social science has been essential to bring into relief 
certain fundamental conditions affecting vocational educa- 
tion. The relative productive capacity of individuals (their 
first measure of vocational success) has many sources 
among which the most distinguishable and important are: 
heredity; the nurturing effects of environment; the by- 
education of play, miscellaneous occupations and general 
education; the by-education of novice or apprenticeship 
participation in the early stages of the vocation itself; and 
direct vocational education for a specific calling. 

II 

Vocational By-Education. — It is clear that all purposeful 
or partially purposeful processes by which one individual 
promotes the vocational capacity of another should be re- 
garded as vocational education, broadly considered. Using 
the term in this sense, it is also evident that substantially all 
adult persons at all times have received some vocational 
education. We can, for any given vocation, in any given 
period, distinguish between different kinds of vocational 
education as : direct or indirect ; good or bad ; fragmentary 
or complete; concrete or abstract; publicly directed or left 
wholly to private effort ; and rationally conceived or resting 
wholly on custom. 

Similarly, we must recognize that more or less good or 
bad vocational education has been involved in the cases of : 
the youth in primitive society learning the use of bow and 
arrow from uncle, father, or other (usually older) asso- 
ciate; the boy on shipboard ''picking up" the arts of the 
sailor ; the farmer's boy learning through his tasks as helper 
to be in turn a farmer; the girl, assisting her mother to 
execute the numberless arts underlying preparation of food, 
clothing, and shelter; the apprentice bound out to a master 



8 Vocational Education 

for a series of years " to learn a trade " ; the student in the 
college of law, medicine, or dentistry; the young man enter- 
ing a bank " at the foot of the ladder," and by combination 
of direct practical experience and outside study fitting him- 
self eventually for the presidency of the institution; the 
prospective teacher training for her work in a normal 
school; the teacher using his practical experience and sup- 
plemental study as a means of fitting himself for a superin- 
tendency; an immigrant, without knowledge of, or skill 
with, machinery, placed in a machine shop and directed by 
the boss in the operation of a particular machine towards 
the performance of particular processes; and the innumer- 
able other forms of adjustment whereby at all times the 
immature, untaught, and unready are nevertheless led, 
helped, or forced on towards specialized forms of compe- 
tency for productive work. 

For the purposes of this book, a fundamental distinction 
must at once be made between direct and indirect vocational 
education. The latter form will usually be described as 
vocational by-education for the reason that such education 
is a by-product of activities designed primarily for other 
purposes. Direct vocational education obviously includes 
only those forms in which training for a specified vocation 
is the primary, central, and controlling purpose, and in 
which production, recreation, control, etc., are all regarded 
as secondary, minor, or incidental purposes. The student 
in the medical college is expected to devote his chief efforts, 
not to the productive practice of medicine, but to learning 
or otherwise preparing to practice medicine. The use made 
of his time, the exercises and studies he undertakes, the 
equipment placed at his disposal, are all designed primarily 
to accomplish definitely conceived purposes of vocational 
education. 

An agency for direct education of any sort is usually 
called a school. Farms, homes, shops, offices, boats, mines, 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 9 

and the like are primarily agencies for productive work and 
not for education. A vocational school may and should do 
productive work as a secondary objective, but such produc- 
tive work is an incidental thing, a by-product; the other 
agencies named often produce education, but that is neces- 
sarily, for them, a by-product. 

It is now clear that at all times in the past and even yet 
the great bulk of the world's vocational education has been, 
and is, essentially by-education. The learner has '* learned 
to do by doing " and his doing has been addressed directly 
to the task of producing valuable service or goods. Even 
under the highly ofganized apprenticeship systems of the 
Middle Ages, the novice was, from the standpoint of his 
master, engaged primarily in producing. The apprentice, 
and particularly the father of the apprentice, who had, per- 
haps, paid a substantial indenture fee, probably conceived 
of the education to be received as the really valuable out- 
come ; but it remained true, nevertheless, that as regards the 
disposition of the learner's time, the use of equipment and 
materials by him, and the gradation of tasks assigned, pro- 
duction was the primary, and vocational education the sec- 
ondary, end. 

Ill 

Direct Vocational Education. — In point of evolutionary 
development, the vocational school succeeds to processes of 
vocational by-education in home, shop, farm, office, ship- 
board, camp, and road as inevitably as does the school for 
literary, religious, artistic, civic, or physical education when 
unspecialized agencies, having these as secondary purposes, 
prove inadequate to the advancing needs of society. The 
home once taught reading and writing as by-products of 
its normal or primary activities (nurture and protection, 
so far as children were concerned). But the home was 
always a poor agency through which to insure the necessary 
minimum of reading and writing. First private schools, 



10 



Vocational Education 



then endowed schools, and finally, public schools, came into 
existence to insure the effective teaching of these necessary 

branches. 

Similarly, the methods of apprenticeship once apparently 
sufficed to give the instruction and training necessary to 
those who were to practice the arts of healing with their 
associated magic and other subsidiary arts. But it long 
ago became apparent that the methods of apprenticeship 
were insufficient to prepare healers of the kind sought or 
required by society under more advanced conditions. The 
need was first met by medical apprentices' courses of lec- 
tures in which successful practitioners expounded princi- 
ples and imparted the information built up through expe- 
rience. These were gradually succeeded by schools of 
medicine which presupposed no apprenticeship, but which, 
building on foundations of a prolonged general education, 
laid broad foundations of scientific knowledge and com- 
pleted the structure of medical education by directed prac- 
tical experience to be obtained through clinical demonstra- 
tion and hospital practice supervised by experts. 

Thus have come into existence vocational schools for the 
training of engineers, lawyers, teachers, priests, dentists, 
war leaders, architects, pharmacists, stenographers, book- 
keepers, accountants, machinists, printers, cooks, barbers, 
and the like. Sometimes the occupation is so modern and 
technical that a state of apprenticeship has never devel- 
oped, — e.g. stenography. Sometimes the methods of the 
vocational school in selecting talent and training it are from 
the outset so acceptable that apprenticeship quickly falls 
into disuse when the product of the vocational school be- 
comes available, — e.g. the engineering professions in 
France, Germany, and America. In many cases, owing to 
poor educational methods in vocational schools or to the 
slow development of appreciation of their work outside, a 
long period intervenes between the establishment of voca- 



The Meaning of Vocational Education ii 

tional schools and the widespread acceptance of those 
trained in them as having superior quahfications. Amer- 
ican normal schools have had to wage a long and hard cam- 
paign to have their product generally accepted even as of 
equal merit with persons just graduated from secondary 
schools of general education. Private trade schools have 
been repeatedly condemned because their graduates have, 
as alleged, not only not learned their trades properly, but 
have in serious respects been disqualified to learn them 
through the routine of apprenticeship subsequently. The 
extent to which American agricultural colleges have jus- 
tified the investment made in them as respects the training 
of men to be successful farmers is still debated (it is not 
questioned that they have been successful in training agri- 
cultural investigators, soil analysts, and other speciahsts). 
Private so-called business and commercial schools for many 
years exploited the ambitions of young Americans to be- 
come successful business leaders; and to-day Hterally hun- 
dreds of thousands of youths of both sexes are found in 
public and private commercial schools seeking what appeals 
to them as a valuable vocational education. That the in- 
struction and training they receive actually functions prof- 
itably as vocational competency in any but one commercial 
calling, is openly questioned even by educators. But the 
success of these quasi-vocational or alleged vocational 
schools in attracting students is eloquent testimony of the 
prevailing popular belief, on the one hand, in the inade- 
quacy of commercial by-education as received in commer- 
cial callings themselves, and on the other, of the possibilities 
of providing effective vocational schools for these fields. 

Intermediate Forms. — It is clear that between direct 
vocational education and vocational by-education certain 
hybrid forms can be recognized. In a shop, for example, 
a foreman may for several days devote himself primarily 
to teaching a new recruit. During this time, production 



12 Vocational Education 

must be regarded as an incident to the teaching process. 
In factories or commercial estabHshments, a recently em- 
ployed man may be required to serve a period without pay, 
it being assumed by both parties to the arrangement that 
the productive service rendered does not more than com- 
pensate for the education made available. Occasionally, 
novices will be found in the offices of architects, lawyers, 
and engineers, or in hospitals, who are contributing produc- 
tive service indeed, but for whom the primary purpose is 
some form of vocational education. 

Then, too, we must recognize the existence of numerous 
schools whose function is not to give the entire vocational 
education as required for the exercise of a calling, but to 
provide one necessary ingredient in it. A man seeking to 
qualify for the position of farm implement salesman in 
Brazil may obtain instruction in Portuguese in a school of 
languages. An apprentice in a machine shop may obtain 
in evening school special technical training in some phase 
of drawing, mathematics, or mechanics. 

These forms of vocational education, partially direct and 
partially indirect, require consideration in their individual 
forms. It is practically impossible to formulate general- 
izations regarding them. Usually they are in a state of 
flux. For example, short course instruction of telephone 
girls has been replaced in many cases by direct education 
in special schools for operatives, maintained by the tele- 
phone corporations. Evening technical instruction tends 
towards so-called " short unit " courses quite specifically 
integrated with the day experience and problems of the 
worker. 

The first decade of the twentieth century has witnessed 
in America a rapidly growing interest in the possibilities 
of publicly supported vocational schools to serve prospec- 
tive workers in the industries, agriculture, and home making. 
The sources and special manifestations of this interest will 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 13 

be discussed elsewhere. Here, it is only necessary to note 
that in general, outside the professions and stenography, 
vocational schools yet play an insignificant part in supply- 
ing the vocational training required by the three to five 
millions of persons who annually enter the ranks of pro- 
ductive work in the shops, homes, offices, farms, camps, 
and railroads and ships of America. There are good rea- 
sons for believing that in many of the callings in these 
fields the efficacy of the by-education of apprenticeship or 
other participation is steadily diminishing, as a consequence 
of which there results a vast social wastage of human 
energy, happiness, health, and life. To trust to by-educa- 
tion is peculiarly characteristic of an age and social order 
strongly influenced by the doctrines of individualism and 
laisses faire. The prolonged maintenance of professional 
schools, private, endowed, or public, represents in some 
degree the outgrowth of beliefs in the desirability and pos- 
sible efficacy of social or collective action. The spirit of 
the age is clearly away from laissez faire and towards col- 
lective action in vocational education. 



IV 

Origins. — The coming of vocational education in schools 
for the rank and file of workers has been dependent in the 
first place upon a social conviction, held at least by the 
thinkers, that the historic forms of vocational by-education 
no longer sufficed for modern needs. This conviction rap- 
idly developed during the closing decades of the 19th cen- 
tury in the industries when it was clearly seen how the 
progress of manufacturing had broken down trade appren- 
ticeship. It came when it was seen that in the agricultural 
occupations the old skills and customs must be replaced by 
new skills (the demands of machine farming among others) 
and scientific knowledge. In the commercial world it came 



-i^ 



14 Vocational Education 

when the rapid evolution of new processes and needs 
showed the utter futiHty of trying to develop apprentice- 
ship training for office and counting-house. And now, even 
in the elemental and primitive field of home making, the 
same conviction is growing, namely, that direct school 
training for this vocation will, in the long run, prove more 
effective and economical than the hit-and-miss processes of 
the by-education of the home itself. 

There could, of course, be no genuine vocational educa- 
tion offered through schools tmtil the public believed such 
schools to be practicable. It has taken nearly a century of 
blind experimentation, false starts, the pioneering efforts of 
philanthropists, and the speculations of educators and social 
workers to give us even our present body of imperfectly 
tested knowledge and theory as to the ways and means of 
training in, or under the direction of, special schools for 
even a few of the thousands of occupations that men and 
women — and even adolescent boys and girls, the juvenile 
workers — must follow. 

Many of the difficulties historically encountered in try- 
ing to provide direct vocational education have been due to 
the fact that in their earlier stages almost no vocational 
schools have been designed to give both the skill and the 
knowledge required for the successful pursuit of a calling. 
The evening classes established by the Mechanics Institutes 
in our industrial cities nearly three quarters of a century 
ago were intended to supplement apprenticeship. The 
short extension courses in special forms of agricultural edu- 
cation which have long flourished in our agricultural col- 
leges have usually presupposed a basis of hard practical 
experience already obtained in the University of Hard 
Knocks. The mechanical drawing and industrial art 
classes which spread rapidly after 1870 were in large part 
also forms of extension education. Even our earlier law 
and medical colleges — the work of which consisted chiefly 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 15 

of courses of lectures given by able practitioners of these 
professions — were designed chiefly by persons who had 
already served an apprenticeship in the office of lawyer or 
physician. 

Or else these earlier vocational schools were planned to 
teach the '' principles " of a vocation, leaving '' practice " 
to be acquired later in actual experience. The private 
schools of business practice which so widely exploited the 
credulity of the public after the Civil War, insisted, indeed, 
upon skill in handwriting; but for the rest, they taught the 
" principles " of bookkeeping, commercial arithmetic, com- 
mercial law, and the like, leaving practical wisdom and skill 
to be learned later through the hazardous by-education of 
office, salesroom, and road-canvassing. Modern commercial 
and business schools, with their hundreds of thousands of 
pupils, do indeed now teach quite successfully and in a basic 
way two commercial arts which are vocational chiefly for 
girls only — namely, typewriting and stenography. But 
for the great bulk of commercial vocations these schools can 
hardly be considered, as yet, vocational in any fundamental 
sense — perhaps the words "technical schools" best de- 
scribe them. Like the commercial schools, our engineering 
colleges and their imitators, the ''technical high schools," 
and also the agricultural colleges, have devoted themselves, 
not to the teaching of vocations in any practical sense, but 
rather to the attempt to teach those things so dear to the 
schoolmaster type of mind, to wit the '' principles " or the 
supposedly essential mathematics, art, science, and '' tech- 
nical knowledge "of one or several vocations. Only slowly 
and reluctantly are these schools adding to their courses 
"field work," "practical work," "shop experience," and 
other forms of "learning through doing" — and at first 
these are required only in the vacations and marginal hours. 
The pedagogical effectiveness of a system of vocational 
education divided between earlier technical school study and 



i6 Vocational Education 

later practical experience in the world of actual work is one 
of the big subjects for future investigation. For very 
many learners the values of this form of " cold storage " of 
the '' principles " of vocational knowledge long in advance 
of practical application may be very much doubted. (An 
interesting contribution in this field is the recent Carnegie 
Foundation " Report on Engineering Education.") 

It is now fairly clear that for the industrial and farming 
callings as these must be practiced by the rank and file of 
workers, technical school education in advance of practical 
experience is of little value — in fact, educators of greatest 
insight have lately come to regard it as having some very 
bad after-consequences because, for the individual learner, 
it is apt to be illusory and unreal. The usefulness and 
large future possibilities of genuine extension education 
(that is, technical knowledge and special supplemental 
skills given to those already engaged in the practical pursuit 
of a calling) are, on the other hand, more obvious than 
ever, and undoubtedly good extension teaching for all voca- 
tions has a promising future. 

The Modern Movement. — But what we now recognize as 
the modern movement for vocational education in schools 
begins with the recognition, on the one hand, that for nearly 
all industrial and farming callings, technical knowledge 
acquired in advance of practical experience is of little real 
value as vocational education; and, on the other, that the 
acquisition of practical experience in the occupation itself, 
to be supplemented later by " extension " education in 
evening school and short course, is acquired frequently 
under most unsatisfactory conditions. 

This modern movement hardly dates back to the begin- 
ning of the present centur>% at least in America. The fun- 
damental question presented to it and by it was this : How 
can society, by means of specially designed or adapted 
schools, insure integral or basal training for the numberless 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 17 

special vocations in which men and women insure their own 
prosperity and through which the community and the nation 
themselves become strong and wholesome? How far can 
the state secure this vocational training without relying 
upon the unorganized and often incidental training given 
by master workman, foreman, employer, farmer, or parent ? 

To the schoolman the essential novelty of the situation 
thus presented consists in the requirement that facilities for 
the practice of the calling in some apparently practical way 
and under educational direction, shall be provided in, or 
under the immediate oversight of, the vocational school. 
No longer could the so-called vocational school consist only 
or chiefly of classrooms, desks, blackboards, and textbooks, 
reinforced by a sky-lighted room for drawing, a few base- 
ment rooms for laboratory or tool exercises, and a sun- 
room or green-house for plantwork. Not only must the 
new vocational schools, as proposed, have workshops, or 
farms, but it was even suggested in some quarters that the 
work done in these shops or on these farms ought to be 
somewhat like the real work done in the outside world. 
Visionaries began to talk about '' productive work," a 
" marketable product," " quantity production," a '' wage for 
the learners " ! 

All of these proposals looked very sensible to the prac- 
tical man outside the schools, but to public school educators 
they were too revolutionary. He first resisted flatly, then, 
when forced by public opinion, and the results of exper- 
imentation carried on chiefly by private effort, he evaded, 
dodged, substituted, confused issues, and appealed to 
prejudices just like the devotees of any other profession 
which has heretofore rested largely on a basis of custom and 
tradition. (Reference is made, of course, to schoolmen in 
general; there have been some, perhaps many, shining 
exceptions. ) 

The last fifteen years, therefore, have been the toddling, 



i8 Vocational Education 

teething stage of growth of vocational education. It has 
naturally been subject to many of the diseases of childhood. 
At times it was not certain that the infant would live; and 
some have doubted whether it was worth raising. The 
present writer can say with good grace that it has been a 
noisy brat; and he is well aware that some of its foster 
nurses have made uninterested people rather tired by their 
predictions as to how the infant would some day become 
a lusty youth who would whip the other and less vulgar 
youths in the vicinity and even make some respectable 
older folks look to their laurels. 

Since the whole-hearted entry of the national govern- 
ment into the support and partial direction of vocational 
education of the kinds here under discussion (especially 
under the provisions of the "Smith-Hughes" Act), the 
entire situation has assumed a new aspect. The infant is 
no longer regarded as a foundling and interloper. He is 
growing and learning fast. We can see now that, while he 
will not meekly confine himself to a corner, neither is he 
likely to become a bully, even if in a few cases he is given 
for a while the food and freedom of " dual control." He is 
really capable of being civilized, even though our refined 
schoolmaster senses will long object to the workaday 
clothing that he must perforce wear, and to the odors of 
machine shop and stable that necessarily cling to him. 

V 

The Future. — What of his probable future, during, let 
us say, the next twenty-five years of adolescence? It is well 
that we should strive to forecast this future, in order that 
we may plan for it intelligently. There are, therefore, sub- 
mitted for preliminary criticism some more or less specu- 
lative predictions, expressed somewhat categorically for the 
sake of brevity. 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 19 

1. Unquestionably, vocational education is destined to 
have an enormous growth in the near future. There are 
hundreds, if not actually thousands of callings for which 
the present methods of vocational by-education, unorgan- 
ized, incidental, haphazard, are wofully inadequate, either 
for the good of the individual or for the good of society. 
For each of these we shall have appropriate vocational 
schools. From two to three hundred thousand young men 
each year recruit the ranks of the farmers of this country. 
Eventually, nearly all of these will have some special train- 
ing for farming, both at the outset as basal or initial voca- 
tional education, and later as extension instruction or even 
extension training. Operatives in all kinds of factories, 
locomotive engineers, housewives, sailors, soldiers, farm 
laborers, postal clerks — all' these and thousands besides, 
may be expected to precede their entry upon full-time wage 
earning by some very direct and positive vocational train- 
ing during the months or years just preceding the assump- 
tion of that work; and, after beginning wage earning, they 
will in continuation, evening, or other type of extension 
school continue their education towards high forms of 
vocational competency, 

2. Like all other forms of publicly supported education, 
vocational education will be organized and directed by rep- 
resentatives of the public, charged, among other things, 
with maintaining it at a high degree of efficiency, and also 
in a thoroughly democratic spirit. Usually the same board 
will direct all types of public education for a given area. 
But national aid, under constitutional provisions now exist- 
ing, will have to be given without direct control ; hence the 
national supervisory body (supervising expenditure of na- 
tional money) will doubtless continue to be a special body 
ad hoc. Where one school serves an entire state or a large 
area — a medical college, a school of printing, a highly 
specialized school of farming, as e.g., almond growing or 



20 Vocational Education 

ostrich farming, a dental college, or a school of glass manu- 
facture — it will probably have its special board, as is the 
case now often with normal schools, state technical schools, 
and schools for defective or delinquent classes, or it may be 
one of several types of schools to be governed by one state 
board. Each distinctive type of vocational education will 
necessarily have its own expert specialist direction, both 
locally and on behalf of the state. The bogy of " dual con- 
trol," evoked chiefly by a few selfseekers on the one hand, 
or obscurantists on the other, will soon be downed. Pure 
dual control has nowhere existed; and such temporary ex- 
amples of partial dual control as have prevailed have been 
due largely to the exasperation of practically all at the 
ignorance and " stand-pattism " of the academic pedant who 
has not infrequently been in control, as layman or salaried 
specialist, of the existing school machinery. 

3. The natural first thought of parents and citizens with 
regard to what we call vaguely a vocational school is that 
it ought to be as accessible as the local public elementary 
school, or at least the neighboring high school. We hear 
school superintendents asking "what kind of vocational 
school should be provided in the small town ? " This atti- 
tude, of course, is the product of our na'ive and unanalytical 
thinking about vocational education and the very natural 
longings of uncritical folk — lay and speciaHst — that a 
" panacea " or " vocational simple " can be discovered that 
will fit all needs alike. It is this same quest after an " easy 
way " that has begotten our deep faiths in the possibilities 
of educational " simples " for training mind or character. 

But study of the sober realities now convinces us that in 
many cases the mountain will not come to Mahomet. The 
youth seeking the vocational school will have to go to the 
Mountain. In such trades as plumbing, electrical work, 
pattern making, printing, house-carpentry, poultry-raising, 
optometry, and automobile repair, it is probable that in no 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 21 

state can there be provided more than a few centrally 
located schools. For operatives in textile, shoe, pottery, 
and munitions manufacture; machine shop production; 
clothing making; food packing; and cigar making — to 
mention only a few manufacturing industries — special 
schools will naturally tend to be located in centers of these 
highly aggregating industries. Youths from rural areas 
or in cities where these industries are not found will simply 
have to leave home to get their desired vocational education 
in them. Eventually it may prove decided economy for 
the state to subsidize in part, towards their expenses of liv- 
ing and travel, those bona fide aspirants who must live away 
from home whilst getting needed vocational training. We 
may expect the development of scientific methods of voca- 
tional guidance in the near future to be such as to guarantee 
that the vocational choice, once made, will be followed up 
to the extent normal for that vocation. 

4. One of the largest illusions now prevalent in vocational 
education is that a vocation, once entered upon by a young 
person, must be followed through life. The fact is that 
modern life is organized very much on a series of occupa- 
tional levels, and the beginner naturally enters upon some 
level adapted to his immaturity and inexperience. No one 
seriously expects a girl of sixteen to be a school principal 
or a housewife; yet in many states more than half of all 
girls at sixteen have already entered upon full time wage 
earning in callings that are truly juvenile occupations. No 
one expects a youth of eighteen to be a locomotive engineer, 
a machine shop foreman, or a contractor. The man who is 
the typical farmer at the age of forty was probably a hired 
worker on a farm (his father's or another's) from sixteen 
to twenty-five, then a tenant or renter farmer and, in middle 
life, a farmer managing his own land and capital. In all 
our great manufacturing callings there exist sometimes 
scores of levels indicated by varying wage rates, and, to a 



22 Vocational Education 

large extent, advancement from one to the other is effected 
on the basis of increasing maturity and experience, and 
would be greatly simplified and expedited if, preliminary 
to each new level, adequate specific vocational training could 
be provided. Even in the so-called skilled or " all-round " 
trades — which are almost everywhere undergoing an in- 
evitable economic decline — the age of effective entry on 
apprenticeship is rising. Anciently in Europe it was in 
what we would now call childhood's years, and it is still 
as low as fourteen for many handicraft occupations fol- 
lowed in Central Europe. In America apprenticeship is 
rarely begun before sixteen, and in many cases eighteen is 
now preferred; yet many of those who must eventually 
become artisans are under necessity of contributing to their 
own self-support at the age of fifteen and onwards. 

The vocational schools of the future — even those giving 
basic or initial full time vocational education — must be 
available not only in suitable varieties for those millions 
who are ready and eager for a period to enter upon juvenile 
vocations; no less, they must be available for those who 
are to pass from juvenile occupations to those available for 
persons in the early flush of manhood; and still again, when 
men and women, now mature and self -knowing, seek to 
pass to higher stages of their callings, to foremanship, or 
even to wholly different pursuits. Between twenty-two 
and twenty-five the typical American city-dwelling girl, 
after from three to seven years of wage earning, leaves 
behind her first vocation and follows thenceforward the 
vocation of homemaker. It may well be that in our best 
agricultural schools in the future we shall train the typical 
boy of from fifteen to eighteen to be a skillful farm em- 
ployee; and that another type of school will be open to him 
at twenty-five when he is ready to become a managing, 
self-directing farmer, 

5. It is now fairly obvious to all who have their eyes 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 23 

open that effective vocational education for almost every 
calling must begin with the actual practice, in elementary 
stages, of that calling, on what is now called a productive 
basis; and that technical knowledge will be introduced and 
integrated with experience only as the progress of the pro- 
ductive work, organized, of course, primarily for educa- 
tional purposes, renders that process intelligible and effec- 
tive. This is the basis of the productive shop, the tests of 
'' quantity production," the home project in farming and 
homemaking and the numerous part-time proposals all now 
being experimented with. 

6. The writer is convinced that as soon as we really find 
ourselves in the pedagogy of vocational education we shall 
evolve and resolutely hold to the principle that learners 
engaged in productive work as an educational process shall 
receive in wages the net worth of their work — its total 
value, less a reasonable charge for interest, rent, overhead 
charges, direction (not including education), etc. The 
value of this wage for pedagogical purposes, as giving the 
learner a constant measure of the worth of his product — 
qualitatively and quantitatively — will be inestimable. Only 
in certain forms of part-time work, and in the well devel- 
oped home project in agriculture, do vocational learners 
now realize a wage (or labor) return for their work. The 
process should be extended to all forms of basic (as dis- 
•tinguished from extension) vocational education. Even in 

home project homemaking (of which we see signs on the 
horizon), the home in which the girl works must accept as a 
necessary condition the giving of the girl a money equiva- 
lent for her practical, productive work. 

7. Much remains yet to be done in developing the edu- 
cational project as the central unit in the pedagogical organ- 
ization of vocational education. We have made good 
beginnings in agricultural education ; but in industrial, com- 
mercial, and homemaking education we have as yet not 



24 Vocational Education 

even respectable beginnings. We sometimes think a prac- 
tical ''job" is a project; but it is no educational project, 
certainly, until its related technical knowledge and social 
insight have been woven or geared into it. We sometimes 
talk vainly about " projects " in technical knowledge alone. 
But this is pedagogic silliness and fad following. Tech- 
nical knowledge by itself organizes very well into problems, 
experiments, exercises, and topics; but not into projects. 

8. Liberal education and vocational education — how 
shall they co-exist and correlate? This is still a pons 
asinorum for all of those educators who cannot think in 
terms of the twentieth century. Shall we have vocational 
education in the high school ? Yes, if the floors and grounds 
of the high school, primarily designed to serve the purposes 
of liberal education, can be adapted to give practical train- 
ing to locomotive engineers, coal miners, street car motor- 
men, sailors, printers, shoe machine operatives, traction 
engine drivers, poultry raisers, carpenters; no, if sincere 
and honest (no camouflaged) vocational education for these 
callings requires the provisions of realistic working con- 
ditions and genuine productive work. 

When the learner, whether at fifteen, twenty, or 
twenty-five years of age, is ready to enter upon his voca- 
tion (or, equally, the vestibuled approach to it, provided 
by the vocational school) shall he give one hour daily 
to some dainty studies of that vocation, or shall he give to 
its pursuit an honest seven or eight hours daily? For the 
present we see neither sincerity nor effectiveness in the 
" blended " or " layer cake " programs of liberal and voca- 
tional education as it is often proposed to organize these 
within the working day. But, after the youth has begun 
his vocational education, shall we not provide for some 
continuance of his general or liberal education? Assur- 
edly — but not within the hours devoted by the average 
man to his vocation. Let our boys in agricultural and 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 25 

trade schools be encouraged and helped to extend their 
cultural interests in evenings and on holidays; let us thus 
early begin to form, in the hours appropriate to them, the 
avocational, social, and recreational interests, tastes, habits, 
and insights that we desire to see these people carry through 
life. Let us not do the silly thing of trying to use for this 
purpose the hours that nature and old social custom dictate 
shall be given to vocational pursuits. 

On the other hand, as regards the eight or more years 
now required to be given by our youths exclusively to gen- 
eral or liberal education and the four or more years that 
are optional — let us see that this precious time is utilized 
to the utmost. We schoolmasters have many sins of omis- 
sion or incompetency to answer for here, where our aims 
are so vague, our methods so unscientific, our results so 
unanalyzed and untested. 

9. Many are the superstitions in education that we may 
expect to see blown up or dried up during the next twenty- 
five years. We shall certainly plumb the shallowness of the 
" cold storage " education which seeks to fill the mind with 
technical knowledge of a vocation before its practice is 
begun. We shall see the folly of confusing general or 
liberal education for children in rural communities with 
vocational agricultural education for those who are to be 
farmers. We shall learn to appreciate the almost criminal 
ignorance, the almost willful blindness, of those who deny 
or dispute the possibilities of definite vocational education 
for the highly specialized or so-dubbed " unskilled " occu- 
pations. We shall learn that good schools for the respective 
species of vocational education are not the rivals of good 
schools for liberal education, but their very desirable and 
necessary complements — that together they contribute to 
the rounded education, but that alone they give only a one- 
sided education. 



26 Vocational Education 

VI 

Courses and Curricula. — Our educational literature con- 
tains, as yet, only few and inadequate examples of what can 
properly be described as principles or programs of voca- 
tional education. For practical purposes we can distin- 
guish in the successful practitioners of almost any calling, 
certain qualities that can be collectively designated as skills 
(manipulative or manual, mental, and managerial) ; certain 
other qualities that can be designated as technical knowl- 
edge; and certain other remoter qualities of ideal, morale, 
understanding of the social significance of work, and the 
like which can conveniently be designated as " social appre- 
ciations." But writers and curriculum makers rarely make 
vocational competency as a " total thing " the starting point 
of their work. They assume the continuance of conditions 
of apprenticeship learning or something analogous to that, 
after the completion of what is called vocational school 
education. Frequently vocational school teachers will say, 
almost boastingly, that it is not their province to train 
workers — engineers, machinists, salesgirls, etc., as the case 
may be; theirs is the responsibility only of instructing in 
" principles," in the '' science," or the " art " of the voca- 
tion. This has long been the position defended by teachers 
of " applied science " in engineering and agricultural col- 
leges, and of other technical subjects in schools supposedly 
educating for " business life," for the homemaking callings, 
for the " art-using " vocations, and even for " farming " 
and teaching. 

The underlying assumption here, not always expressed 
in words, is that skills and other similar qualities essential 
to vocational success must be acquired in pursuit of the 
vocation itself. The school professes itself able to teach 
only the technical knowledge and a few forms implicated 
in technical skill (Hke drafting for engineering). Some of 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 27 

the schools of this class now attempt to offer " social appre- 
ciation " studies related to the vocation — its hygienic, 
economic, and cultural aspects, to give breadth of view ; but 
the efficacy of these offerings must still be a subject of 
doubt. 

In the light of current developments of educational 
thought, however, it would seem indispensable that the 
entire body of theory heretofore underlying the formation 
of curricula for professional and other vocational schools 
be completely revised. These curricula seem almost uni- 
versally to have been planned with chief reference to the 
limitations at the time known to exist in providing courses 
of instruction and means of teaching. The first question 
was not — what are the total requirements of the vocation 
for proficiency in the individual? but, how can a school be 
provided to teach the technical subjects supposedly needed 
in certain vocations? Hence the historic vocational school 
has sought only to be a complementary school — before or 
after practical experience obtained in the pursuit of the 
calling itself — and has not only remained indifferent to 
the prevailing requirements of the vocation, but has even 
sought incessantly to persuade itself that what it did not 
give in the way of training in skills, managerial powers, 
etc., was of little importance or was surely to be acquired 
in actual practice anyway.^ 

The results have never been satisfactory. Vocational 
schools have often been conducted by faculties of specialists 
who were not, and in many cases could not be, successful 
practitioners of the vocations in question. " Follow up " 

1 Certain exceptions should be noted : schools of nursing, because 
of the peculiar conditions attendant upon their foundation and devel- 
opment, seem usually to have made the total of vocational proficiency 
their direct aim; and schools of medicine and elementary school teach- 
ing seem latterly to have founded their programs on fairly adequate 
conceptions of the total requirements of the callings for which prepa- 
ration was designed. 



28 Vocational Education 

work has been most inadequate and rarely of a kind capable 
of actually affecting the schools' standards. 

It is not, of course, to be expected that even the most 
perfect vocational school will give a complete vocational 
education in the sense of completely equipping the individual 
for the exercise of his calling at its full rate of compen- 
sation. This is not accomplished even in professional 
schools that are most fully developed. The by-education 
of participation is essential to give complete mastery. But 
that vocational schools can much more effectively and eco- 
nomically give certain portions of vocational education than 
can agencies organized for other purposes and offering in- 
struction and training only as by-products, is now certain, 
as regards a large number of vocations. This has been 
abundantly demonstrated in the case of the professions and 
in some other callings; and it is intrinsically probable as 
regards all callings. 

VII 

Extent and Variety of Vocations. — How many " voca- 
tions " are now followed in the United States ? No one 
can say with accuracy. Table I (page 515), abridged from 
the United States Census of 1910, gives at least these: agri- 
culture, 30; Mining, 15; Manufacturing and Mechanical 
Pursuits, 200; Commerce (trade), 35; Commerce (Cler- 
ical), 10; PubHc Service, 17; Professions, 30; Domestic 
and Personal Service (excluding homemakers), 30. 

But of course, many of the simple heads used by the 
Census — such as farmers, farm laborers, coal mine oper- 
atives, carpenters, electricians, silversmiths, machinists, shoe 
factory semi-skilled workers, clerks in stores, soldiers, 
teachers, and agents — are exceedingly composite. There 
is very little in common, as regards vocational qualifica- 
tions, between the poultry grower in Massachusetts, the 
orange grower in California, and the " general farmer " of 



The Meaning of Vocational Education 29 

Iowa. Coal miners, silversmiths, shoe factory operatives, 
teachers, and clerks in stores represent in each case many 
highly distinctive vocations. 

The " Trade Specifications and Index o£ Professions and 
Trades in the (U.S.) Army" (1918) analyzed 565 dis- 
tinctive callings, each requiring special qualifications. 

Table II (page 531) shows how the United States Census 
classifies the 105,000 workers reported employed in auto- 
mobile manufacturing; while Table III (page 532) shows a 
siniilar analysis of the specific occupations grouped under 
'* Wholesale and Retail Trade." 

It is a safe assumption that at least 2,000 important dis- 
tinctive vocations are followed by the workers of America, 
and that for each, specific vocational education in schools 
may be desirable and is probably feasible. 



CHAPTER II 

THE SOCIAL NEED OF BETTER VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 

Some Necessary Distinctions. — There are many defi- 
nitions of education, hence there can be many possible defi- 
nitions of vocational education. The best definitions can 
be made, as stated in the previous chapter, from observation 
of the social facts of vocation. All animals, including hu- 
man beings, have to " earn their livings." The powers 
whereby animals do this seem largely instinctive, their in- 
stincts being often perfected by experience. Man also has 
a large variety of instincts that are basic to the skills and 
technical knowledge which he gradually builds up. But 
man, far more, apparently, than any other animal species, 
develops a " social inheritance " of useful arts and scientific 
knowledge, which each new generation must " learn." 

The broadest definition of vocational education, therefore, 
covers all this learning of the social inheritance, as that takes 
place in the case of any individual acquiring powers of pro- 
ductive work. But in such learning at least three levels or 
stages can be distinguished. Children, youths, and even 
adults are so stimulated by their instincts of curiosity, imi- 
tation, and emulation that, up to a certain point, they will 
acquire skill and knowledge from others if only opportuni- 
ties are available. Such acquisition is usually carried on in 
the play or amateur spirit. A second stage comes when, 
even in very primitive societies, the young or even adults as 
slaves, are forced to begin work, in the course of which 
vocational learning takes place as a by-product of such work. 

^3° 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 31 

A third stage is found when a period is set apart in the life 
of the individual for systematic education for his vocation. 

In this book the words '' vocational education " will usu- 
ally designate only direct vocational education or education 
in vocational schools where the primary purpose is educa- 
tion and where production is only an incidental end. The 
first and second stages of vocational education noted above 
will usually be described as vocational by-education, that is, 
as by-product education, the actual skill, knowledge, and 
ideals acquired in any case being a by-product of play or of 
productive work. 

No well-informed man will dispute the assertion that such 
vocational competency as is now found is usually the prod- 
uct of vocational by-education. Only for certain well- 
known professions and a few lesser vocations like stenog- 
raphy are well developed vocational schools yet available. 
When, therefore, we speak of social demands for "vocational 
education " we actually mean demands for more direct and 
purposive education to supplement or to replace the by-edu- 
cation now or heretofore found. If current social demands 
for improved vocational education are serious, it must be 
that the means and methods of vocational by-education, as 
developed through thousands of years of experience, are not 
sufficiently effective for modern life. Such ineffectiveness 
could be due to several causes. Possibly the historic forms 
have declined in efficacy. Such seems to have been the case 
with organized apprenticeship in the handicraft trades and 
some commercial callings. Perhaps the methods of by-edu- 
cation are ill-adapted to modern conditions in the vocations. 
Such seems clearly to be the case in the farming and home- 
making vocations. Perhaps vocational by-education is 
good, but too expensive of time and energy. Such seems 
to be the case in various pursuits involving delicate ma- 
chinery. But back of all of these are certain large facts of 
economic demand. 



32 Vocational Education 

I 

The Effects of Progress. — One of the most conspicuous 
of all the results of social progress — under which we must 
include such factors as increase of population, rising stand- 
ards of living, more extensive cooperation, growing inter- 
est in protection and increase of the well-being of the indi- 
vidual, mastery of natural resources, and the like — is the 
multiplication of the wants of the individual. Many of 
these wants, at first regarded as desires for luxuries, soon 
become in reality the needs of each individual who has be- 
come a member of social groups having civilized standards 
of living. 

For people trying to maintain an " American standard " 
of living these wants to-day include factors of housing, cloth- 
ing, education, recreation, and physical comfort of which 
our forefathers hardly dreamed, and which still are only re- 
mote aspirations to many peoples of the Orient and else- 
where in the world. It is sometimes urged by superficial 
talkers that " four hours' labor " would produce all that the 
average man " needs." Perhaps, if we sufficiently restrict 
the word " needs " ; but it is humanly certain that the aver- 
age man would, if he found that he could provide the neces- 
sities of hfe through four hours' labor — as possibly he could 
even now in places of ample resources in America — usually 
elect to work four additional hours in order to obtain thereby 
better housing, the diversions of travel, and the other " lux- 
uries," that are sought eagerly by those with rising stand- 
ards. 

Individual Production. — It is axiomatic that in the long 
run each normal individual should produce or render at 
least as much service as he consumes.^ Otherwise, a de- 

1 In economic literature, distinctions are made between the various pro- 
cesses involved in production whereby such processes as exchange and 
transportation are separated from actual first stages of production of raw 
materials or of elaboration of raw materials into finished products. 

Throughout this work, however, the various processes of exchange 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education ^2> 

cline of social energies would ensue. But the capacity of 
the individual to produce goods, or to render service, varies 
greatly with age, training, social position, and accessible op- 
portunity. We expect children, from birth (or before) to 
the age of six or more, to consume much service and to ren- 
der none in return (economic service and goods are here 
meant, of course — namely the means of satisfying needs 
or desires for which, in common usage, we are accustomed 
to pay money or exchange service). From six to fourteen 
in those civilized states which make and enforce laws safe- 
guarding the rights of children to education and to protec- 
tion from injurious labor, young people render little eco- 
nomic service and consume much of it. Somewhere between 
fourteen and twenty-five according to economic status and 
vocational ambitions the average individual becomes a pro- 
ducer. At first he may produce only enough for his own 
needs, but soon, under normal conditions, he must produce 
a surplus over his own needs in order that he in turn may 
do his share in carrying his children over their period of 
non-productivity, as well as in providing for the non-pro- 
ductive aged, and other dependents. Finally, after a period 
of fruitful years, the productive capacity of the worker de- 
clines and he may spend the closing ten or twenty years of 
life as a non-producer, his demands being met from the 

and transportation are included with production, simply as extensions 
of the productive processes. We can recognize that all production in- 
volves the necessity for some transfer and storage on the way to the 
destination of consumption, even when the consumer of a given article 
is himself its producer. When a given producer desires to exchange 
his product for the product of another producer, we have the elemen- 
tary stages of transportation and exchange, all of which in the last 
analysis, must fairly be regarded as extensions of the process of pro- 
duction. The value of a commodity can most truly be estimated when 
it is ready for consumption, the intervening stages between actual 
source and the consumer having been passed. In the economic sense, 
therefore, all that is production which adds economic value to the arti- 
cle, until it finally reaches and becomes available for the consumer. 

D 



34 Vocational Education 

labor of others, or, under best conditions, from the returns 
received from the stored or accumulated results of his pro- 
ductive service which are being rented and u«ed by others 
— interest on invested capital. 

Universality of Vocational Education. — It is from the 
base line or sea-level of these fundamental considerations 
that we must survey questions of vocational education. 
Clearly, every person who renders productive service must 
have had some training to that end. That training, histor- 
ically, has been good or bad, purposeful or haphazard. It 
has usually come as a by-product of voluntary or forced 
participation in productive work accompanied by incidental 
'' showing " of points or " tricks " of the trade. Vocational 
training has, of course, been but one of the means consciously 
or unconsciously adopted by society to further the produc- 
tive capacity of its members. The development of customs 
and standards of sustained and cumulative effort (labor, 
toil, drudgery, the '' curse " imposed on Adam) ; explora- 
tions and inventions whereby nature is controlled to man's 
purposes; the establishment of ideals and means of storage 
of products of service for future use (thrift, property, sav- 
ings, invested capital) ; the organization, specialization, and 
even regimentation of productive effort towards concert of 
action in certain forms of production — all of these must 
be included among the means whereby society endeavors to 
meet the demands, increasing in geometric ratio, of multi- 
plying populations composed of members each with increas- 
ing wants. But, in the last analysis, the vocational train- 
ing of the individual is the most vital simple requirement 
to be met, because such training alone lays effective founda- 
tions for other forms of productive effort contributed to 
society. With rare exceptions, only those persons best 
trained for their vocations contribute new inventions and 
discoveries; they only fit effectively into cooperative pro- 
ductive processes organized in complicated stages and sub- 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 35 

divisions; and they only have a vital appreciation of the 
needs and possibilities of provident forethought under 
modern economic conditions. 

The primary aims of vocational education being, then, to 
enhance directly the productive powers of the individual 
(the objects of liberal or general education being to improve 
his powers of utilization), it follows that the effectiveness of 
that education for any period and for any occupational field, 
whether as by-education or as direct education, must be de- 
termined primarily in terms of results as found in the total 
productive life of the individual — for convenience, let us 
say between fifteen and seventy years of age. For some 
callings, the net wage or income return may be accepted as a 
fairly satisfactory measure of the man's productivity, since 
that, in a social situation w^here forces of supply and demand 
operate normally, is the measure of the products of service, 
and service itself which other persons are disposed to give 
him for his service. We can thus measure the production 
of farmers, sailors, clerks, trade workers, servants, lesser 
business men, and " average " men in the professions. 
There are, of course, other callings in which this measure 
does not apply satisfactorily. The homemaker (as wife and 
mother) customarily receives no wage as such, while some 
of the most arduous service she renders {e.g. the care of 
sick children) can hardly be at all estimated in terms of 
economic value. Public opinion recognizes that no propor- 
tionate return in economic goods will probably be made to 
the poet, inventor, philosopher, scientist, explorer, soldier, 
or statesman for the services rendered by him. On the 
other hand, there exist sinecures (happily a diminishing 
number) in which, by virtue of some ancient custom or 
technical twist in the machinery of society, the incumbent, 
holding to his place like a true parasite, is able to exact from 
society more than a fair return for the service he renders. 
Hereditary places, emoluments and titles, and the *' pro- 



36 Vocational Education 

tected " positions in monopolized fields of service are ex- 
amples no less than those of successful thieves, profiteers, 
gamblers, and " kept " wives and entertainers. It is also 
true, too, that for substantial periods the free play of com- 
petition in rendering service and in obtaining full return 
therefor may be arrested by the resistance of monopolistic 
groups so united in close cooperation as to be able to exact 
disproportionate returns. How far such monopoly pre- 
vails or is possible under given conditions is a matter for the 
experts to decide. 

Nevertheless the social economist is safe in assuming that 
in general the prevailing rewards of service secured by any 
individual express with reasonable accuracy the willingness 
of others to exchange their service for his service notwith- 
standing the serious dislocations of effort and disturbances 
of means which occur from time to time in the normal oper- 
ation of the laws of demand and supply. If we take ac- 
count of the workers in America in their millions, — farm- 
ers, housewives, railway operatives, physicians, teachers, 
clerks, artisans, mill workers, soldiers, industrial managers, 
salesmen, — it is fair to assume that, under existing condi- 
tions of natural resources, utilization of scientific knowledge, 
economic organization, fostering legislation, immigration, 
customary working hours, mobility of labor, availability of 
capital, courage of "enterprisers," and scarcity of "crea- 
tive " or original capacity, the average money return to 
workers in each class as well as, — with occasional excep- 
tions, — that to each individual, represents an approximate 
measure of his productive capacity measured in terms of its 
exchangeability for the services of others. 

Increase of Productive Power. — How far and in what di- 
rection is it desirable and practicable that such productive 
capacity be increased, among other means, by vocational edu- 
cation? The western nations everywhere and a portion of 
the Orient have accepted and now approve those 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 37 

conceptions which hold a dynamic society to be desirable, 
and which approve of social evolution. We now accept the 
great social desirability of having social evolution — natural, 
or humanity assisted, — take the direction called progress, — 
that is, towards producing human life " more abundantly," 
in the broadest acceptance of that phrase. We recognize, 
and on the whole approve of rapidly increasing populations 
even though these involve an apparent overtaxing of the 
land to produce food, and especially live stock. It is gener- 
ally held that many of the forms of individual well-being 
which we hold as socially valuable can be secured only 
through increase in the purchasing powers of the individual 
or of a group of individuals. We want for children more 
years devoted to education, that is, to preparation for effec- 
tive adult life as that is made possible by further prolonga- 
tion of developmental infancy and childhood; we also want 
for these children better living conditions as a means of 
growth, — food, shelter, facilities for play, wholesome com- 
panionship, travel, artistic surroimdings, freedom from fear; 
and we want to guarantee them entry on productive work 
under favorable auspices. On behalf of adults we aspire to 
shorter hours of labor, richer opportunities for use of leisure, 
prolongation of active life, the maintenance of a strong 
family without excessive present strain or apprehension for 
the future, and the gradual storage of at least a moderate 
capital as productive investment. But the attainment of all 
of those desirable ends presupposes greater productive ca- 
pacity in the individual either as a result of his own greater 
capacity personally, or of the development of more favorable 
conditions for the exercise of that capacity, such as discov- 
ery of more natural resources, new inventions, better lead- 
ership, more abundant capital, easier distribution of goods, 
and the like. 

There is now much evidence that, through more effective 
specialized education, such individual productive powers 



38 Vocational Education 

can be greatly increased. Here, as in the field of general 
education, it could readily be assumed on a priori grounds 
that so important a function as fitting the individual for 
optimum productive power should not always be left to the 
irregular and partial operation of processes of by-education. 
In the professions the processes of by-education, except in 
the latest stages of such education, have fallen into disuse and 
have been replaced by vocational school education. It is 
freely admitted that in all callings involving, for their 
successful exercise, a considerable amount of technical 
knowledge, — e.g. horticulture, electric installation, assay- 
ing, machinery testing, optical grinding, navigation, ac- 
counting, salesmanship in foreign countries, forest con- 
servation — some direct special education is indispensable 
to success. 

The movement for more effective vocational education in 
the United States, and in other civilized countries, — a move- 
ment which has manifested itself in the shape of widespread 
interest in the various questions involved, the formation of 
societies to promote study of the subject and tentative efforts 
for experimental and constructive work, — must be inter- 
preted as representing one of the larger efforts of contem- 
porary society to insure the wide promotion of human well- 
being under conditions of a steadily increasing population 
and which is in some directions, at least, pressing heavily 
upon the means of maintaining the standards of living which 
have come to seem desirable. 

Vocational Education and the Individual. — The primary 
object of the state or of society in its collective capacity in 
promoting effective vocational education may be considered 
to be the safety of the state itself. Nevertheless, the secu- 
rity and effectiveness of the state can be achieved as one of 
its conditions only by means of individuals who are in them- 
selves effective physically, vocationally, civically, and cultur- 
ally. Furthermore, the function of the state, in the last 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 39 

analysis, is the promotion of the well-being of the individuals 
composing it, and, under these circumstances, vocational 
education may be considered also from the standpoint of 
its possible contributions to individual well-being. 

In promoting the well-being of individuals, it is a funda- 
mental principle that state action or other corporate action 
should take place only when the competency of the individ- 
ual himself or of those immediately responsible for him 
proves insufficient to guarantee an optimum of the condi- 
tions making for such well-being. By universal consent, the 
state, then, guarantees a protected childhood to every person 
born into society, this protection extending even to the point 
of removing the child from its parents or natural guardians 
in case their incompetency can be established. The ideal 
of a protected childhood is also realized through compulsory 
education, through prohibition of labor of young people ex- 
cept under stated conditions, and through guarantee of cer- 
tain opportunities for growth and development such as play- 
grounds and freedom of movement. 

It now becomes sound public policy also to include under 
the general designation of a protected childhood such a start 
towards economic independence as the state itself can in- 
sure in the event that the family and the individual himself 
prove unable to satisfy these needs. Elsewhere it has been 
shown that under modern conditions of industry, especially 
in large centers, the family and industry are proving more 
and more unable to insure either adequate vocational guid- 
ance or, more important, sufficient vocational training to 
constitute for given individuals a reasonably fair start in life. 

II 

The enhancement of the productive capacity of an indi- 
vidual by vocational education may first be considered in 
three relationships affecting himself alone : (a) His produc- 



40 Vocational Education 

tive capacity under optimum economic conditions at any 
given period; (b) his productive capacity as a whole, that 
is, during the span of his working Hfetime; and (c) his 
productive capacity as a net remainder after subtractions 
have been made on account of physical, cultural, and civic 
demands. 

Intensive vs. Extensive Productivity. — For example, a 
given system of vocational training might result in a high 
productive capacity for a short time, but might fail to lay 
proper foundations for promotion or other vocational 
growth. It is believed by some that many forms of modern 
industrial employment lead to early enforced retirement — 
railroading is frequently used as an example. The primitive 
forms of farming, on the other hand, are supposed to 
admit of useful participation not only of children but also 
of very old men and women and even when these are not, 
by virtue of their ownership of capital, in managerial posi- 
tion. Available data on these matters are, however, inade- 
quate and obscure. It would obviously be possible to train 
a person for what is an essentially juvenile vocation and to 
ignore the vocational needs to be met in adult life. 

Or a system of vocational education might be mapped out 
which would take cognizance of a possible total working 
lifetime. It is well known, for example, that a large pro- 
portion of girls now follow a wage earning vocation for 
some years prior to marriage. A complete program of vo- 
cational education might include not only this wage-earning 
period as its objective, but also the subsequent twenty or 
thirty years of homemaking. There are those, indeed, who 
also foresee a period in the life of the strong woman when, 
after her children are grown, the routine of homemaking for 
two adults will not suffice to keep her powers adequately 
employed. For this period of her life also, she might well 
have the needed guidance, training, and opportunity to ren- 
der such economic service as she can. 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 41 

It is probable that certain complex social problems of 
labor adjustment are involved in the ideal of so organizing 
vocational education as to insure a long life of productive 
activity. As traditions go at present, the man somewhat 
past middle age who cannot " keep the pace " set by younger 
men or by himself when younger, is apt to consider his use- 
fulness at an end (or the employer does so, with the same 
result) and to give up his job, possibly to relapse into com- 
plete idleness. Ideally, of course, society should offer to 
each, in quantity and quality, opportunities for the work that 
he can best perform. It seems to be a fact that in primitive 
stages of industry the aged or impaired man still had oppor- 
tunities for work which are largely denied him in more ad- 
vanced stages of economic evolution. Whether labor con- 
ditions can be so readjusted in the future that the man of 
declining powers will still find and willingly accept a place 
of usefulness is one of the unsolved problems of contem- 
porary social economy. 

Non- Vocational Needs. — Vocational powers must also be 
considered with reference to the other obligations and op- 
portunities of the individual. A vocation in which a man 
might be highly productive over a long series of years but 
which denied him opportunities for family life or discharge 
of civic obligations would necessarily be heavily discounted 
by these disadvantages. There are callings in which health 
risks are great, especially for individuals predisposed to 
specifiable forms of weakness. Here again the claims of the 
vocation as a field of productive opportunity are not the 
only claims to be considered. Many juvenile occupations in 
factories, for which relatively high wages are often paid 
by virtue of the restricted or speciaHzed character of the 
activities involved and possibly by the speed required, seem 
to entail heavy handicaps on physical development. The ad- 
vantages of these, therefore, from a wise social standpoint 
will be heavily offset by the health liabilities included. 



42 Vocational Education 

It is possible that America may in the future require what 
has long been the case in Europe, namely that each male 
citizen shall be required to devote a portion of his time to the 
defensive service of his country. Under these conditions, 
preparation for, and participation in, vocation will measur- 
ably have to give way to required military training which 
can be regarded as a secondary vocation. Similar condi- 
tions of less obvious nature are involved in the possible con- 
nections between vocation and the man's civic or cultural 
life. A vocation such as teaching may, for a given individ- 
ual, involve cultural opportunities not to be found in mining 
or farming. The man qualified to profit culturally from an 
urban environment may very properly refuse to enter a 
vocation necessitating rural residence, and vice versa. 

Ill 

Essential Factors in Productivity. — The potential power 
of an individual to produce economic goods will always be 
greatly affected by conditions largely beyond his control, of 
which the following are the most important: a. The nat- 
ural or other resources available ( fertile land for the farmer, 
ores for the miner, timber for the woodworker, fibers for 
the textile worker, interested audiences for the singer, seek- 
ers after superior medical skill for the physician, husbands 
and their incomes for the homemaker, etc.) ; 

b. Social inheritances of vocational knowledge and 
method (inventions, customs, arts, technical knowledge of 
process, etc. ) ; 

c. Capital, fixed or mobile, such as is represented by: 
cleared land, buildings, discovered mines, timber made ac- 
cessible by roads, transportation facilities, etc., for farmers 
and miners ; buildings, engines, tools, and revolving funds to 
keep up food supply and wages while goods are in process 
of production and delivery to final markets, etc., for indus- 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 43 

trial workers; house, furniture, reserve money, etc., for the 
homemaker; and offices, stocks, and storerooms for com- 
mercial workers; 

d. Social organization of demands for products — or 
markets — involving, of course, extent and character of 
opportunities for procuring useful exchangeable goods in 
return for products ; 

e. The inherited bodily powers and capacities of the in- 
dividual ; 

/. The acquired powers and capacities of the individual, 
— health, civic, cultural — which, while not valued chiefly 
as affecting vocational competency, nevertheless have impor- 
tant bearings on it. 

1. Basic Essentials. — Obviously no man can farm on 
rock, mine gold or coal where none exists, build modern 
houses or ships when there can be had no timber. A teacher 
or preacher can get no productive return for his services 
where learners or listeners are not available. " The voice 
of one crying in the wilderness " does not command wages. 
Manufacturing industries, no matter how skillful the work- 
ers, can produce nothing without a supply of raw materials. 
Homemaking as defined in this book obviously requires for 
its practice a place of residence, a husband, children, etc., as 
necessary working materials. 

It is important to note that the part played by raw mate- 
rials or natural resources in production is affected heavily 
by what may here be called " pressure of population." 
When population is sparse, the relative value of raw re- 
sources may be made to yield the maximum possible re- 
turn. 

2. The Social Inheritance. — In a very true sense pro- 
duction in modern society is almost completely dependent 
upon the social inheritance of inventions given by our pro- 
genitors. The arts of metal working, fabric making, till- 
age, defense, communication by symbol, preaching, and 



44 Vocational Education 

teaching represent but a part of this inheritance. Of prac- 
tical importance is the fact that in the processes of social 
competition of peoples, regions, and nations, no less than 
individuals, the race will in large measure be to those who 
best use and improve upon the social inheritance, whether 
that be through a new variety of potato, a better explosive, 
an improved process of tanning, the invention of a new syn- 
thetic dye, a better system of filing, the more thorough ex- 
clusion of flies from the home, or a better balanced ration- 
ing of an army. Technical knowledge and implements play 
a part in modern production, the importance of which is fre- 
quently overlooked by the easy theorizers as to '' collective " 
action. These instrumentalities, as a matter of fact, are 
largely responsible for the increasing part played by capital 
and organization in modern production. The actual re- 
sponsibility of given individuals, even those in directing 
positions, for the improvement of old, and the discovery of 
new means of production, is probably smaller than is com- 
monly assumed and is now diminishing. It is the collective 
'' mind " of the larger groups and perhaps in increasing 
measure the collective mind of the state itself, which must 
ultimately assume largest responsibility for the progressive 
use of the social inheritance of the tools and knowledge in- 
volved in productive work. 

At any given time a comparison of the methods of re- 
tarded peoples, corporations, or individuals as regards their 
uses of economic social inheritance is both illuminating and 
suggestive. In all communities that are " advancing " by 
prevailing economic standards it will be found that " busi- 
ness " — as the term may be used to denote the aspirations, 
ideals, appreciations, customs, and knowledge of the thinkers, 
planners, and leaders — becomes, obviously, intensely con- 
scious of the importance of improving on historic means and 
methods. Research and invention are stimulated by pro- 
tection, reward, and subsidy. In recent years the state has 



, The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 45 

participated largely in these processes. Government agen- 
cies have been responsible for a very large part of the 
development achieved during the last half century in Ameri- 
can agriculture. 

Systematized vocational education becomes one of the 
most effective means for transmitting the newly developed 
knowledge. The methods of apprenticeship fail here con- 
spicuously. On the other hand invention may, and often 
does, produce the '' fool proof " machine which becomes 
an effective tool in the hands of even a poorly trained user. 
Good watches, machine guns, stationary steam engines, shov- 
els, concrete houses, or automatic stop looms will often ren- 
der excellent service in the hands of illiterate and untrained 
workers, although these tools themselves represent the cul- 
mination of ages of invention in their evolution and of end- 
lessly varied skills and technical knowledges in their fabri- 
cation. The possible secondary social consequences of the 
inventive processes which give us these perfect tools are 
not calculable as yet. 

3. Capital in Production. — The part played by capital 
in production is usually clear to the business man and to the 
economist, but not at all to hired manual laborers, or, it 
would often seem, to legislators. The education designed 
to diffuse such knowledge is, ordinarily, more properly civic 
than vocational ; but for a person preparing definitely for a 
known vocation it is highly desirable that his vocational edu- 
cation should include instruction in the part played by capital 
in the organized productive processes of which he is to be a 
part. It would appear, for example, that successful agri- 
culture in the United States requires increasing outlays of 
capital in proportion to labor. Unless this tendency is mod- 
ified by the development of state or corporate owned instru- 
mentalities, extreme care will have to be exercised jn the 
selection of those to be encouraged to pursue agricultural 
training towards the " farm owning " vocations in order 



46 Vocational Education 

that possession of natural gifts of managerial ability be as- 
sured. Not many men are gifted by nature with the basic 
qualities required by current standards of security and plan- 
ning to be managers of large enterprises, and especially those 
involving much of that easily impaired commodity named 
" capital." 

In manufacturing, transportation, and commercial fields 
of productive enterprise the relationship between capital 
and profits is often obscure to workers. Indeed it is not, in 
the case of a given enterprise, always clear to anyone, since 
the '' dividend takers " or stockholders are often investors 
of capital rather than personal abilities, hence their '' prof- 
its " may often be in reality more '' interest " than " profit " 
as ordinarily conceived — that is, the enterpriser's reward 
for his knowledge, daring, foresight, and organizing ability. 
There prevail to-day widespread beliefs that " profit-takers " 
are, as a class, generally so situated that they can exploit 
laborers and, probably, investors, too. It is easily seen how 
the rewards of labor are largely controlled by the operation 
of the law of supply and demand; and the rewards of capi- 
tal invested for a guaranteed return (interest on bonds, 
mortgages, dividends on preferred stock), it is now gener- 
ally recognized, are also governed in the same way. But 
much doubt exists still as to whether the rewards of those 
who have no guaranteed returns as wages or interest — non- 
salaried entrepreneurs, investors for common stock divi- 
dends — are governed by the same laws of supply and de- 
mand. Probably all distributions of shares of product un- 
der ordinarily prevalent conditions are controlled far more 
largely by the basic law of demand and supply than by all 
other factors — custom, monopoly, ignorance, legislation, 
and the like — together; but until better means than are 
yet available are found to make this clear to consumers and 
various camps of producers, we may expect a continuance 
of the suspicions, antagonisms, and wars that are at present 




The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 47 

distracting and demoralizing production. '' Related social 
education " as part of vocational education should, of 
course, prove increasingly adequate to clear up the situation 
to various kinds of workers in a given field and enable them 
to forestall or correct pathological situations of monopoly, 
exploiteering, etc. But society will probably long be 
tempted, in some of its divisions, by the '' Rhine Gold " of 
the stored capital essential to modernized production; and 
just as primitive men could see little use in October of stor- 
ing large quantities of nuts, seeds, and dried meats against 
December and January, and often preferred to '' feast " at 
once, so whole groups of people will probably long continue 
to see in stored capital promising means of present enjoy- 
ment if only the legal claimants thereto can be dispos- 
sessed. It will require a very well developed system of 
civic or economic education to produce effective " social 
wisdom" here. 

4. Social Organization. — Given raw resources, a large 
social inheritance of inventions and technical knowledge, 
and abundance of capital, productive processes are neverthe- 
less without eft'ect unless there be present various forms of 
social organization. Of these government and laws to de- 
fine and guarantee security and order may be considered of 
first importance. Next is regimentation (in no invidious 
sense) or that coordination of workers by which each takes 
or receives the part in the total process which he can best 
perform. Last is commerce with its subphases of trans- 
portation, storing, and marketing, with endless specializa- 
tions in banking, credit, inspection, standards, and the like. 

Very probably modern production in manufacture, min- 
ing, lumbering, fishing, and some forms of agriculture would 
be wholly impossible on present scales except for the very 
elaborate organizations that have accompanied its evolution. 
The corporation, as a means of providing for concentration 
of capital and regimentation of workers from the most to 



48 Vocational Education 

the least talented, controls to-day in nearly all transportation, 
distance communication, mantifacture, and mining. Every 
industrial state has found it necessary to produce an elabo- 
rate body of legislation as well as various agencies of en- 
forcement in order to protect productive enterprises on the 
one hand, or their special workers and investors or the pub- 
lic on the other. Territorial specialization of production 
has been a marked consequence even where natural localiza- 
tion of raw resources has not dictated it. 

The complexities thus added to the social structure of 
modern societies are still largely beyond the capacities of 
any one man adequately to appreciate. Modern government 
finds the largest single department of its activity in economic 
legislation. The specialization of producers into investors, 
employers, and employees gives rise to class consciousness, 
class organization, and insistent contests for special privi- 
leges in sharing products. 

It is very doubtful whether contemporary means of either 
civic or vocational education are at all sufficient as yet to 
give even a forceful minority of prospective citizens appre- 
ciations, to say nothing of comprehensions, of the vital part 
played by social organization in the economic production 
which enables the multiplying wants of dense populations 
with rising standards of living to be even partially satisfied. 
Here, as in the case of the place of capital in production, 
there is every reason why the vocational schools should play 
a large part in serving both its students and also society. 

5. Individual Inheritance. — The ability of a given indi- 
vidual to produce is in fundamental measure dependent on 
the factors, largely outside himself, discussed above; but in 
another sense it is no less dependent upon inherited and ac- 
quired qualities within himself. A man cannot use the tools 
or the knowledge given by the social inheritance on the 
materials provided by nature unless he possess the muscular 
powers, senses, and organs of intellect characteristic of 
normal human beings. 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 49 

In fact it is now certain that among men great variations 
prevail in the amount and quahty of the various forms of 
'' original nature " inherited. A man naturally small of 
body is thereby disqualified for many types of heavy work. 
History as well as science seem to show that, generally 
speaking, women cannot do the same kinds and qualities 
of work as men. Probably the reverse also is often true. 
A few men seem born with extraordinary endowments of 
mathematical or musical or exploratory or combative pow- 
ers. Very likely some men are born with extraordinary 
potential powers of leadership, business organization, me- 
chanical invention, or artistic ability. The warm advocates 
of vocational guidance may have raised unwarranted expec- 
tations as to the needs and possibilities of " fitting square 
pegs to square holes," but, nevertheless, every observant 
worker with adolescents becomes increasingly convinced of 
the fact that, as the world of work is now organized, there 
is an " optimum " job for every individual, and that it is of 
signal importance to that individual and of substantial im- 
por+^ance> 10 society that he be helped to the discovery of his 
life work (or successive stages in life work) as near this 
optimum as practicable. 

The operation of the " selective service " agencies created 
to meet necessities imposed by the war has revealed unsus- 
pected possibilities of allocating, even through simple psy- 
chological tests, youths or adults to the forms of study or 
productive service best suited to them. At this writing it 
would be premature to summarize the possibilities thus re- 
vealed; but it is certain that every supervisor, director, and 
teacher in vocational schools will hereafter find it of the ut- 
most importance to ascertain, on the one hand, what are the 
optimum requirements (always judged by sane and practi- 
cal standards) of the vocations open to those whom they 
seek to train, and on the other the native qualification pos- 
sessed by those seeking entry to these vocations. 



50 Vocational Education 

It is a fair assumption that the modern specialization of 
industry and the increasing use of automatic and '' fool 
proof " power driven machines serves greatly to extend the 
range of occupational pursuits in which persons of mediocre 
or inferior or even abnormal native powers may become 
productive. When men lived chiefly by hunting it is prob- 
able that many of the poorly endowed starved to death. 
But modern tools and organization can be made greatly to 
help those of good native gifts. Quite probably modern 
society, and especially the state (which is a clumsy and 
backward directing body as yet) has not sufficiently lived up 
to its responsibilities of helping those of inferior powers to 
get into their optimum work. That is a problem of which 
social economists are just now becoming keenly apprecia- 
tive. 

6. Acquired Powers. — Finally the productive power of 
a given individual is very dependent upon his acquired 
powers. These may be considered under two heads — the 
powers generally serviceable in life generally, as well, per- 
haps, as in the vocational activities of life, and ^rhose.^pri- 
marily serviceable in vocation. Obviously the physical, lin- 
guistic, artistic, literary, scientific, and moral powers and 
capacities which schools of general education seek to find, 
improve, or create have some functional value in vocation as 
well as in the other activities of life. On the other hand 
success in a particular vocation always depends upon the 
possession by the individual of a variety of special skills, 
ideals, and forms of knowledge which possess little signifi- 
cance to him apart from his vocation. 

Of non-vocational powers and capacities it is impracti- 
cable as yet to evaluate the importance in modern productive 
processes. Probably it is futile to attempt to generalize; 
only by studying the requirements of particular fields of 
work in connection with particular qualities can we hope to 
reach useful conclusions. The whole subject has been 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 51 

greatly befogged by the attempts of men of strong academic 
prepossessions to state " optimum " standards. 

Looking at workers about us it is clear that in some voca- 
tions the ability to speak English is indispensable ; in others 
it is merely a convenience. One cannot imagine an illiter- 
ate man becoming a successful physician, lawyer, or editor; 
but in many other vocational fields the proportion of success- 
ful men among illiterates is hardly smaller than that among 
literate men, due allowance being made for forces of selec- 
tion. For success in many vocations certain conditions of 
health are desirable or necessary; but it is not in evidence to 
what extent '' health " is or can be made a product of by-edu- 
cation or direct education, and how far it is due to inherited 
conditions. There are many vocations that are open only 
to persons of established reputation for approved moral be- 
havior. The bases of the moral character thus required 
may be due to general school or non-school education; or 
they may, like health, derive in large part from qualities of 
" original nature " that can be discovered but not made. 

For the present it is sound policy to require that the vo- 
cational school or other specialized agency of vocational edu- 
cation take upon itself the burden of proof in sustaining the 
minimum standards of inherited or acquired general fitness 
which it imposes at the outset. It can safely be assumed 
that the men of academic prepossessions who will long be 
in control of the machinery of vocational education will 
tend to impose unnecessarily exacting standards. This cau- 
tionary attitude has nothing to do, be it understood, with the 
provision of desirable standards of general education to be 
met either before entry upon vocational pursuits or in direct 
preparation for such entry. Right minimum standards of 
cultural and civic education should be estabhshed quite in- 
dependently of vocation, as a rule. It is not improbable that 
the high minimum cultural standards long imposed by voca- 
tional schools of theology, law, medicine, military leader- 



52 Vocational Education 

ship, and other vocations involving so-called leadership have 
actually been vocational, or at least vocationally selective, in 
their final analysis and operation. If not, they have prob- 
ably been unwarrantably and factitiously artificial and un- 
desirable. 

IV 

To the educator and to the social economist of the future 
must be left many as yet partially unsolved problems which 
intimately affect the extent and character of the vocational 
education required for given vocations. Among these prob- 
lems are the following: (a) Should "industry" be expected 
to provide for its own vocational training? (b) What are 
the necessary results of specialization? (c) Are the "trades" 
declining? (d) Would vocational schools "overcrowd" 
certain callings? (e) Should men be educated to be "em- 
ployees "? (f) What will be the effects of increasing "state 
control" of production? (g) Is vocational education demo- 
cratic? (h) Should vocational education be compulsory? 
(i) How far should society control conditions of entrance 
upon wage-earning? In the analyses below the writer^s 
present opinion is frequently indicated, usually as a spur to 
further analysis and study. 

1. Private Vocational Education It is sometimes as- 
serted that " industry " should provide at its own expense 
for vocational education. This expectation is usually based 
upon two misconceptions. If a given employer (it may be 
assumed that at the outset every worker starts as an em- 
ployee) could be sure of retaining permanently the services 
of those whom he might train, then countless employers 
would undoubtedly devote no less attention to training work- 
ers than to providing suitable material equipment. But 
such is not the case. The very great mobility of modern 
labor renders it impossible for the average employer to de- 
vote time and energy to the training of novices. Again, it 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 53 

is naively taken for granted by persons who have not studied 
the matter, that in a given field of production, — e.g. gar- 
dening, banking, housebuilding, transportation, — there is 
an important collective interest and, therefore, collective 
will and purpose which should be enlisted to promote private 
vocational schools in these fields. But this ignores the acute 
and persistent competition which normally exists between 
each unit and every other unit in the same field, — a competi- 
tion which only gives way slowly before efforts looking to 
consolidation and combination, which efforts, because they 
commonly foreshadow monopoly, are viewed by society with 
suspicion and are even outlawed. It is conceivable that in 
a new kind of economic order, all the housebuilders of a city 
or state would be combined, as are now, commonly, tele- 
phone operators and street car operators, and that they 
could collectively undertake the vocational schooling of 
young workers. But for the present, we have to assume 
that in general the mobility of labor and the competing in- 
terests of employers will long preclude the development, un- 
d/.L the direction of industry, of good vocational schools. 
Exceptions will be found in those industries which have 
practically suppressed, or at least regulated, competition or 
have learned to cooperate broadly in certain essential re- 
spects, — telephone, street car transportation, a few lines of 
manufacturing like printing, etc. 

2. Specialization. — It is important that the causes and 
effects of specialization, especially in production and ex- 
change, should be examined by students of economics from 
the standpoint of possible effects on vocational education. 
In the absence of other evidence, we are justified in assum- 
ing that specialization of productive effort is an economic 
necessity, that it is one of the most effective means of in- 
creasing the productivity of the individual worker through 
his greater use of machinery, development of more skill 
and concentration on a particular enterprise. In almost no 



54 Vocational Education 

respects does one to-day detect retrograde tendencies in 
economic specialization. Every enlargement in units of 
production, every tendency towards territorial specialization 
of agriculture, and every advance in the use of tech- 
nical appliances seem to be accompanied by increasing 
subdivision of processes and specialization of the v^orker. 
Considering the increasing economic productiveness of 
the worker under these conditions, it is doubtful if 
any class of producers would be willing to exchange 
rewards as they exist under specialization for those which 
they supplanted, regard being had to growing pressure of 
population, scarcities of raw materials, and rising standards 
of living. But specialization is frequently accompanied by 
what may be described as socially pathological manifesta- 
tions. Under some conditions, the specialized worker may 
be described as the " slave of the machine " although prob- 
ably, in some cases, he could more correctly be described as 
the " master " or at least the " tender of the machine." In 
many instances extreme specialization has made the em- 
ployment of large quantities of comparatively unskilled la- 
bor a simple matter. But probably, in an equal number of 
instances, at least, the specialization of the worker and his 
employment in expensive processes has raised the qualities 
of skill, sobriety, and general intelligence demanded of him 
— for example, the chauffeur, locomotive driver, ship cap- 
tain, farmer using a power driven apparatus, furnace man, 
elevator man in large buildings, or drill press operative, etc. 
For the present, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, 
we can well assume that with rising standards of living and 
increasing disposition to demand a wide range of consum- 
able goods, individual producers can achieve their desired 
ends only by increasing their production through specialized 
efforts. 

It is furthermore highly probable that every tendency to- 
wards specialized work will produce pathological conditions 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 55 

against which enlarged ideals of social economy will insist 
on the application of corrective measures, perhaps as forms 
of social sanitation. For example, it may be found that 
highly specialized mechanical operations pursued eight hours 
a day will, in the main, not affect injuriously persons who 
have already attained to maturity of body and nervous sys- 
tem, whereas such eight hour a day work on highly special- 
ized operations might affect very injuriously comparatively 
young people whose bodies are undeveloped and whose 
nervous systems are still very plastic. 

Again, under some circumstances, machine operations 
may be so conducted that the speed of the worker is deter- 
mined by the speed of the machine, over which he has little 
or no control, and that under these conditions, disastrous re- 
sults may be produced even on the adult organism. In the 
light of contemporary knowledge it seems highly probable 
that for operations of this kind, one essential is that special- 
ized workers shall be given examinations in order that those 
most qualified for such mechanical manipulation may be 
selected. Furthermore the speeding up of machinery over 
which the operator has no control may have to be regulated 
by law or inspection. 

There are also possibilities that individual workers should 
be trained to pass, even within the course of one day, from 
one type of machine to another in order to have a change of 
occupation and strain. It is entirely possible that large 
gains would result from transferring, for a part of the day, 
a specialized operative in a very noisy textile manufacturing 
room to some other type of similarly speciaHzed work offer- 
ing materially different conditions. 

As regards noise and other operating strains, no amount 
of argument against specialized work achieves any useful 
purpose unless it takes account of the increased productivity 
made possible by such specialization and the relation of that 
to the higher standards of living demanded by workers. 



56 Vocational Education 

Whether it is sufficient to trust to the law of supply and 
demand of labor as a means of adjustment of workers' 
share in specialized production achieved largely through 
capital invested and managerial intelligence, as well as labor, 
is a question that can hardly be discussed here. If, under 
any given circumstances, a process of specialization of labor 
does not give to the individual worker any share in the in- 
creased production thereby made possible, it may be that 
special social adjustments should be made. This is a ques- 
tion for the economist and is, of course, particularly tied 
up with such difficult questions as the minimum wage, arti- 
ficial interference with laws of supply and demand as regu- 
lating compensation of labor, etc. 

3. The Place of the Trades. — At the present time many 
programs of so-called industrial training in cities of the 
United States are in reality more or less complete programs 
of training for the trades. The word '' trade " as applied in 
industry has various significations, but in the main its con- 
notations are based upon ideals and practices derived from 
the time when trades were, in the full sense of the word, 
handicrafts — that is, hand trades. 

It is well known, of course, that the progressive develop- 
ment of machine production has resulted in a steady decline 
of handicraft trades. This has been especially true in fields 
where production on a large scale is possible. One does not 
commonly associate the idea of trade worker with the opera- 
tions involved in the production of such staples as cloth, 
automobiles, glass and pottery, electrical appliances, furni- 
ture, paper boxes, books, newspapers, ready-made clothing, 
packed meats, packed fruits and vegetables, flour, sugar, 
locomotives, rails, crude copper, coal, pig-iron, lumber, shoes, 
building materials, etc. It is true that some divisions within 
these fields of production wherein a considerable amount of 
skill is involved, have come of recent years to be called 
trades, even though the operation is highly specialized, and 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 57 

in many cases, the participation of the worker is essentially 
that of machine tender. 

Recent years have witnessed the gradual decline of such 
trades as those of cabinet maker, baker, shoemaker, wheel- 
wright, potter, etc., while others, such as tailor, dressmaker, 
etc., are in process of decHne. Great changes are undoubt- 
edly also taking place in the structure and organization of 
such trades as machinist, plumber, bricklayer, carpenter, 
printer, and glazier, while, of course, pending changes in in- 
dustrial processes develop new trades such as those asso- 
ciated with the installation and maintenance of electrical ap- 
paratus, steamfitting, and the like. 

It is of the utmost importance in the interests of sound 
thinking about vocational education that we shall not confine 
ourselves exclusively to the terms and conditions of the 
handicraft trades. Modern production is specialized and 
there is every prospect that it will become much more spe- 
cialized. Standardization of materials for building and even 
the standardization of buildings themselves, may be a matter 
of the near future. 

It is not improbable, of course, that where, in the process 
of production, much subdivision has occurred, an individual 
worker should be trained to cover more than one subdivision, 
partly as a means of enabling him to shift his services in 
time of necessity, partly to give him a wider range of work 
as a means of conserving health, and conceivably also, as a 
means of enabling him better to understand the sequences of 
productive processes involved in his field of productive 
enterprise. 

4. Overcrowding of Callings. — One of the earliest ques- 
tions encountered in establishing vocational schools is the 
danger of overcrowding certain callings. Nowhere, so far 
as the writer is aware, is there any adequate discussion of the 
conditions involved in what are known as " overcrowded 
callings." Overcrowding must be conceived in reference 



58 Vocational Education 

to some relative or absolute standards, and it may be doubted 
whether, in the absence of these standards, we are justified 
in calling any one calling more overcrowded than another. 

Certainly it would be folly to speak of the medical pro- 
fession or the teaching profession or farming as over- 
crowded. Relative overcrowding may be conceived in 
terms of an established or desired rate of compensation. 
For example, domestic service is not now overcrowded as 
evidenced by advertisements in newspapers, if the historic 
rate of compensation is taken as a basis. On the other 
hand, if we were to pay domestic servants at the same rate 
that we pay trained nurses, it may be questioned whether 
we should not find the calling immediately overcrowded. 
Newspaper advertisements seem to indicate a perennial 
scarcity of sixteen to twenty year old girls in department 
stores and factories. Are we to assume no overcrowding 
here? 

Where attractive rates of compensation have historically 
existed, there is a tendency for persons to enter the calling 
and competitively to bid against each other for the higher 
compensation, thus giving every appearance of an over- 
crowded field. Would we be justified in saying that the 
field of unskilled labor is, for example, more overcrowded 
than that of skilled printers, machinists, bookkeepers, small 
merchants, lawyers, college teachers, etc. ? 

Where a calling may demand considerable amount and 
variety of personal qualities as well as certain forms of 
technical skill, the advertising of an opening frequently at- 
tracts persons who possess only in part the qualities desired, 
but who, nevertheless, hope to find themselves the best 
among the offering. There is thus given a specious appear- 
ance of overcrowding in the calHng in question. This is 
noted conspicuously when vacancies in public school posi- 
tions, in various departments of the civil service, and in 
managerial positions, are open. 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 59 

5. Employer vs. Employee. — Almost every man in the 
highly civilized modern state stands in some capacity as an 
employee in society and in some other capacity as an em- 
ployer. In all forms of corporate organization of business, 
stockholders may be looked upon as the final employers, 
while directors are their selected representatives and re- 
sponsible to them in very much the same sense that actual 
employees are responsible to their immediate employers. 
Under the directors in any corporation every person is an 
employee, but in many cases these also have employers' re- 
sponsibilities towards other subordinates. 

Persons who are employed in a corporation have organi- 
zations or unions each having their own employed delegates ; 
thus the employee becomes an employer in turn. It would 
be exceptional to find to-day in any case of transportation or 
production through corporations an individual who is not 
at some time and place an employee and, at some other time 
and place, an employer, with all of the responsibilities that 
these relations imply. 

In a very real sense every citizen is the employer of " pub- 
lic servants " from president and governors down to teach- 
ers and policemen. 

Outside of agriculture, homemaking, small shopkeeping, 
the professions, and a few trades, relatively few adults ^are 
ever "independent" workers; while in nearly all fields of 
work, young workers first undertake productive service dis- 
tinctively as wage-earners. These facts must necessarily 
greatly affect vocational education for young workers. 
Ought we to think of young men even in agriculture as prob- 
ably destined to "independent" work before twenty-five? 

6. State Control. — Study of contemporary tendencies 
exhibits a great variety of developments of state control 
looking towards the more satisfactory relation of the em- 
ployee to his work and its returns. Much legislation al- 
ready exists defining the age at which young workers shall 



6o Vocational Education 

be employed on so-called " dangerous " machinery or in 
" dangerous " trades. A very great variety of legislation 
defining appliances to be used on railways, protective devices 
in factories, regulations for the use of so-called " danger- 
ous " chemicals, etc., now exists. Employers' liability laws 
persistently operate in the direction of regulating, in the 
light of scientific knowledge, conditions under which work- 
ers may operate machines, undergo risks, etc. 

We also see now extended state control of rates that can 
be charged by public service corporations, of the extent 
to which corporations will be permitted to organize in the 
form of trusts, of the sale of speculative securities, and in 
addition, of publicity of accounts. In all of these directions 
we may count upon a steadily increased tendency towards 
that form of regulation which experience will demonstrate 
to provide for the maximum of common welfare. 

Besides these it is manifest that state ownership or direc- 
tion of productive enterprises is increasing. The major 
parts of education, road maintenance, fire protection, light- 
house maintenance, public service inspection, water supply, 
waste disposal, mail and package carrying, and dock provi- 
sion are now municipal, state, or national enterprises. Prob- 
ably these tendencies will, when understood, greatly affect 
the needs of, and procedures to secure, vocational education. 

7. Is Vocational Education Undemocratic? — Educators, 
business men, and social economists, who during the last 
decade have been supporting the movement for more effi- 
cient vocational education than that which is now provided 
incidentally and intermittently by farm, home, shop, and 
office, have encountered various forms of opposition. Be- 
cause they sought the creation of efficient schools for the 
training of farmers, trades workers, homemakers, and cler- 
ical specialists, they have been charged with seeking to de- 
stroy the regular public schools. Because they urged that, 
for young people past the age of compulsory school aj- 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 6i 

tendance, opportunities should be made available for definite 
and practical training in the technique of trades and other 
callings, differentiated as these are in the world of practical 
affairs, they were charged with being interested only in 
" narrow " education — in the " teaching of mere skill." 
Because they recognized and held that the training which 
makes a young man a good tailor is essentially different in 
all details from the training which makes his brother a good 
carpenter, they were charged with supporting proposals for 
" undemocratic " education. 

Now the issues of vocational education are far too im- 
portant to permit of their being damned by the vague word 
'' undemocratic." We want nothing more incorporated into 
American education, public or private, that is contrary to the 
sound principles of democracy — we have too much of 
that. If the plans now before the peoples of many 
states — notably, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, 
Indiana, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut — for 
the improvement of systems of vocational education already 
established with state approval, and under state control and 
support, are in any respect undemocratic, it is in the highest 
degree essential that early proof of that fact should be given. 
Progressive states, east and west, north and south, are, in 
the persons of their most far-sighted citizens, now planning 
for state systems of vocational schools. The national gov- 
ernment provides financial aid and cooperative supervision 
for at least three types of vocational education — namely, 
industrial, agricultural, and homemaking — and will doubt- 
less aid basic commercial education in the near future. 

What then are the specific characteristics of the voca- 
tional education here under consideration, as judged by the 
legislation already enacted, and administrative plans already 
promulgated in the states that have got past the stage of dis- 
cussing? An understanding of these facts is essential to a 
determination of the possible validity of the charges made 



62 Vocational Education 

relative to the supposedly undemocratic character of vo- 
cational education. 

First, wherever vocational schools have been established, 
admission to them is conditioned on completion of the re- 
quirements of compulsory school attendance. As a rule 
these requirements include both an age qualification, and 
also a scholarship qualification — usually at least the com- 
pletion of the fifth grade. In other words, no youth may 
enter a vocational school until he has reached the point 
where he is equally free to enter the shop or of!ice as a full- 
time worker, or to spend his (or her) days exclusively at 
farm or home work. To the charge sometimes made that 
the specialized vocational school is "narrowing " it is a fair 
retort to question whether it is more " narrowing " than the 
place in the department store, the specialty in the factory, 
or the daily routine of of^ce, farm, or home. For these 
are certainly the prevailing alternatives. In every industrial 
community, we know that at least half and often many more 
than half of all the children leave school forever within six 
months after completion of the requirements of compulsory 
attendance. 

In the second place, the vocational school has found spe- 
cialization a necessary means of efficiency. Even common 
sense will satisfy us that the special training required to make 
a proficient machinist will differ in all significant respects 
from that required to make a house-painter. Are there any 
fundamental elements of vocational training common to ste- 
nography and carpentry ? Practical electricity and tailoring ? 
Farming and stone-masonry? Teaming and bookkeeping? 
Homemaking and printing? Persons who have not clearly 
defined for themselves the special character of vocational 
education will, in their confusion, contend that certain ele- 
ments are common among people who successfully follow 
these vocations, such as elements of health, physique, char- 
acter, general intelligence, mental acumen, and social ideals. 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 63 

The reply, of course, is that in so far as these quahties are 
not differentiated and speciahzed according to the vocations 
being followed, they are the legitimate objectives, not of vo- 
cational schools at all, but of schools of general or liberal edu- 
cation. In any northern state, the public school has had at 
least eight years of the child's life in which to lay the founda- 
tions of culture, citizenship, character, and general intelli- 
gence. For our industrial and commercial workers, this is 
now more commonly ten or even twelve rather than eight 
years, a larger amount of time on the whole than is given in 
any other country in the world. It is not certain that our 
public schools now make very effective use of this time, and 
it is not in evidence that systematic, specialized vocational 
training will make no important contributions, as a by-prod- 
uct, to these general qualities. 

During the last decade a great change has taken place in 
the attitude of Americans towards vocational education; by 
which we now mean any specific education designed to pre- 
pare a person for the effective pursuit of some calling. 
Formerly, it was seriously questioned whether publicly sup- 
ported and controlled schools should undertake training for 
industrial, agricultural, and homemaking callings. This at- 
titude persisted, notwithstanding that in western state uni- 
versities the professions were being taught, that even the 
national government was giving financial aid to higher forms 
of agricultural education, and that cities had extensively 
developed commercial departments in high schools. 

But it is hard to-day to find an intelligent man who does 
not believe that, for large numbers of our young people, 
some form of systematic and direct occupational training is 
essential — essential from the standpoint of the welfare 
of the individual, as well as from the standpoint of the com- 
munity and the state. 

This thesis is here submitted: That education as it has 
been organized heretofore in the United States, while not 



64 Vocational Education 

so undemocratic as that of countries where, by means of the 
varying fees charged for tuition, children are practically 
segregated along caste lines, has been much less democratic 
than it will be when a properly organized system of voca- 
tional schools shall have been created to add opportunities 
for occupational training to those now existing for general 
education. 

What is the essence of democracy? Does it not consist 
in removing as far as practicable all artificial barriers (birth, 
rank, wealth) to the enjoyment of equal opportunities; and 
mitigating, as far as society can safely do so, the inequalities 
created by natural conditions? 

Now it is fair to characterize as undemocratic a system 
of schools like that of Prussia, where, for example, at least 
three different classes of school are open to a boy of thirteen 
years of age of good ability ; namely, a school in which only a 
nominal charge is made for tuition, another in which a fee 
of perhaps eighty marks is charged, and a third charging up- 
ward of one hundred and eighty marks. Inevitably sons of 
poor people can go only to the first, whilst the last will in 
effect be reserved for the sons of the prosperous and prom- 
inent. 

American high schools are not undemocratic in that sense ; 
they are tuition free, and equally accessible to the son of the 
washerwoman and the son of the millionaire. But there 
does exist a condition in America to-day which is essentially 
undemocratic. Contrast the opportunities now open to the 
son of the wage-earner who has four or five children in his 
family with those available for another boy of equal ability 
whose father has an income of $5000 per year. In the first 
case, the boy from necessity and from honorable desire, too, 
not excessively to burden his father, must become a self-sup- 
porting worker at not later than sixteen years of age. The 
second boy can postpone self-support until twenty-two or 
even twenty-five or twenty-eight. 



The Social Need oj Better Vocational Education 65 

But what school opportunities are open to the first boy 
on completing the eight grades of the elementary school? 
He can perhaps attend a high school for two years, in which, 
theoretically, he will be continuing his general or liberal edu- 
cation, but in which, practically, he will be given only the 
husks of introductory algebra, a foreign language, ancient 
history, and very formal English. Practically nowhere can 
he find opportunity to obtain definite equipment for some 
field of productive work. He must enter upon employment 
as an unskilled laborer, one of a horde of the " hired to-day, 
fired to-morrow " kind. Every step in his advance towards 
the occupational competency of manhood is beset by vicissi- 
tudes and oppressive conditions. In some cities, he finds 
evening schools to help ; in most places, none. 

The other boy, less hurried, prolongs his general educa- 
tion to eighteen, possibly to twenty-two years of age. Or, 
eager to get at work after two years of general high school 
work, he finds commercial departments of high schools open- 
ing opportunities for at least a partial vocational training to 
him. n he finishes the high school, he finds scores of 
openings for vocational education before him, state schools 
of agriculture, engineering or teacher training, endowed 
schools, often with scholarships, for theology, medicine, 
law, and other professions. His road to vocational com- 
petency is beset by no such difficulties, exposed to no such 
hazards, as that of his fellow. 

But these undemocratic inequalities are largely created by 
society; they are not due to natural causes which the state 
cannot correct. It is the state which says in effect : " To 
them that have shall be given, and from them that have not 
shall be taken away even that which they have." 

The hardships wrought by this situation on individuals 
are apparent, but it is none the less true that society in its 
collective capacity suffers also ; state and nation are not what 
they should be when a large per cent of their members reach 



66 Vocational Education 

mature life unfitted for first-class productive work, discon- 
tented and vagrant, ready, often, to turn their anger against 
the state itself. 

What, now, are the essentially democratic characteristics 
of current proposals for vocational education, as exempli- 
fied in the legislation of at least half a dozen of the more pro- 
gressive states? First, the state continues, just as hereto- 
fore, to exact on the part of each youth a minimum period of 
school attendance in a school of general education — closing 
in no case before the completion of the fourteenth year; 
similarly, it exacts as heretofore a minimum standard of 
scholarship — usually at least the equivalent of the fifth 
grade, with a strong tendency still further upward. 

In other words, no one is eligible to enter a vocational 
school until he has reached the point where he is equally 
eligible to quit school altogether and become a factory hand, ' 
an errand boy, a casual laborer of any sort. Let us remem- 
ber that nowhere is it yet contemplated that attendance on 
vocational schools shall be compulsory. In the very nature 
of things, that time cannot come until we shall have available 
almost as many types of vocational schools as there are vari- 
eties of positions to be filled. A compulsory requirement 
then would necessarily look only to enforcing attendance on 
some type of school, and not to prescribing the particular 
type for a given individual. It is unthinkable that the state 
should any more desire to prescribe the particular type of 
school which a boy shall enter than that it should dictate 
the particular employment that he shall enter. 

What becomes, then, of the charge that the provision of 
vocational education in schools makes for caste, for an un- 
democratic condition of society? It is clear that existing 
economic conditions inevitably produce social stratification. 
Boys who leave school at fourteen and enter upon the ca- 
reers which will leave many of them permanently stranded 
as unskilled workmen will always constitute a social and cul- 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 67 

tural class apart (fortunate for society if they do not con- 
stitute a political class apart also) from their more fortu- 
nate fellows who can prolong their education toward profit- 
able vocations. But is there anything at all in current pro- 
posals for vocational education that will aggravate this sit- 
uation? Is it not clear, on the contrary, that every step in 
the provision of practical education towards earning compe- 
tency will lessen rather than increase the rifts between dif- 
ferent economic classes ? 

8. Should Vocational Education be Compulsory? — For 
the present, of course, it would be futile and ridiculous seri- 
ously to propose to make attendance on vocational schools 
obligatory, since we have so few facilities available, and es- 
pecially because we have no adequate knowledge yet of how 
to organize and conduct schools for vocational education to- 
wards the great majority of callings. Nevertheless funda- 
mental principles are clear enough. In a democratic society, 
as in any other society, the social good takes final priority. 
The ignorance, short-sightedness, or selfishness of individ- 
uals or their immediate guardians cannot be allowed to work 
ill to the commonwealth. It is an evil thing for the larger 
group when a given individual, naturally qualified, is unwill- 
ing, or unable by virtue of neglected education, to produce 
enough to support himself and to aid in meeting the com- 
mon needs of the group. 

Society now lays upon the normal adult the positive re- 
sponsibility of providing for the support of himself and 
those towards whom he has assumed legal obligations for 
support, under normal conditions of economic production. 
The vagrant and family deserter can be sent to prison. But 
if experience should show that inability to produce ade- 
quately is in many instances due to failure to take advan- 
tage of available opportunities for vocational training 
then it will seem as logical for society to move towards 
compulsory vocational as it is now for it to require com- 



68 Vocational Education 

pulsory literary education or observance of the essentials of 
sanitation. 

One novel difficulty will be encountered. There is but 
one reading or writing; there are thousands of vocations. 
Who shall decide what vocation a given person shall be 
compelled to learn? Probably present approved practices 
of providing vocations for adults will give guidance. So- 
ciety now, except in time of emergency, like war, does not 
force adults into particular vocations; in democratic spirit 
it leaves that choice to the individual so long as he seems to 
make reasonably effective use of his freedom. But if he re- 
fuses to enter upon a vocation — to go to work — then so- 
ciety forces him into a prison or " workhouse " where those 
occupations which can be carried on under prison conditions 
— rock breaking, jute weaving, shoemaking, road-building, 
chair caning, broom making, and the like — are prescribed. 

We can imagine a state which has provided or guaranteed 
facilities for vocational education towards every local vo- 
cation. The youth would be given free opportunity to elect 
according to his taste, subject to the condition that society 
would limit entrance to vocations, the normal " absorbing " 
capacity of which is known. If a given individual, after 
enjoying opportunities to do so, gives no promise of choos- 
ing and properly qualifying himself for a vocation, then so- 
ciety would compel him to choose a field in which educational 
procedures for *' recalcitrant squads " were known to be 
effective. In times past English courts used to sentence 
minors or vagrants to the navy. We now commit young 
delinquents to what were formerly called " industrial " 
schools where, under compulsion, they are supposed to learn 
a trade. 

Eventually society will exact a guarantee that every youth 
shall become vocationally efficient before it is too late; but 
it will leave to him the largest practicable amount of free- 
dom by which he will meet the social requirement. 



The Social Need of Better Vocational Education 69 

9. Control of Entrance upon Wage-Earning In all civi- 
lized countries society now clearly asserts the right to estab- 
lish and enforce minimum standards of age and physical 
condition for entrance upon wage-earning callings. In 
many cases, by systems of licensing and certification, it also 
determines minimum standards of vocational skill and in- 
telligence to be met. These restrictions may appear some- 
times to be imposed in the interests of the individual — as 
where boys under eighteen are prevented from working at 
machines, or youths under twenty-one are prohibited from 
telegraph messenger night service ; but in the long run it will 
be found that it is the common good of the larger society 
that dictates these interferences with immediate individual 
freedom. 

Does anyone seriously doubt that we are probably des- 
tined to see a constant increase in this kind of control? 
Doubtless it will not always be wise — that is, it will be 
based upon imperfect understanding of what the actual 
needs of society are. Doubtless restrictive legislation of 
this kind will often be used for exploitative purposes — since 
*' exploiteering " reaches into many departments of life be- 
sides those chiefly affected by desires for economic gain. 
Nevertheless it is along this road that the forces of social 
economy must, in large part, travel. 

We may reasonably expect extension of the principles 
of compulsory vocational education, as noted above ; we may 
expect to see restrictions of numbers permitted to enter given 
fields (perhaps effected through competitive examination, 
and, when better knowledge is available, scientific '' selec- 
tive service ") ; and we shall probably witness general appli- 
cations of the " minimum wage " principle. 

In the past the skilled workers in a trade were often said 
to " own the trade " ; that is, they established standards of 
apprenticeship, of wages, and, in large measure, the working 
conditions. That there should be some form of social reg- 



70 Vocational Education 

ulation of these matters, as practiced by the historic guilds, 
only the most stubborn individualist would deny. Whether 
other social groupings than the state itself will prove compe- 
tent for this purpose is still doubtful. Laissez faire will not 
do, the social economists seem to agree; vocational group 
control seems to lead to guild selfishness and monopoly; 
consumers' groupings seem unworkable; and certainly we 
must apprehend the blundering action of municipality, state, 
and nation. 

One thing is clear : for any vocational field, the vocational 
schools should represent the best centering of appreciations 
of needs of the guild of trained workers on the one hand, 
and appreciations of the requirements of sound public policy 
on the other. That this has not always been the case with 
professional schools is to be deplored; but it would seem 
that medical colleges, engineering colleges, agricultural col- 
leges, and schools of nursing have set some excellent prece- 
dents. 



CHAPTER III 

THE RELATION OF GENERAL TO VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 



Origins of General Education. — The world has long been 
accustomed to schools for direct general education. These 
have only remote relationships to vocational education. 
Early in the progress of the evolution of modern civiliza- 
tion the home found itself unequal to the task of teaching 
children the arts of reading, writing, and computation, and 
hence schools were developed for this work. Under con- 
ditions where some language other than the vernacular was 
the medium of communication — orally or in writing — 
for the learned or professional classes, special schools for 
the classic language and its literature flourished. The evo- 
lution of the printing arts extended the fields of the general 
education which all were supposed to have to include at 
least some geography, history, and, later, science. The 
nineteenth century brought compulsory education in nearly 
all civilized coimtries, and the minimum education thus en- 
forced has been measured chiefly in terms of ability to 
read, to write the vernacular, and to perform ordinary 
arithmetical computations. 

Thus were laid the foundations of what we call '' gen- 
eral " education — the education which is believed to be 
necessary or valuable for all, irrespective of the particular 
vocations which they are to follow. We must not, how- 
ever, suppose that general education has not had and does 
not now possess significance as affecting vocational com- 

n 



72 Vocational Education 

petency. At all times parents, and more especially the 
poorer and less literate, have regarded the acquisition of 
the arts of reading and writing and particularly computa- 
tion, as being of the greatest importance in equipping their 
children for the economic struggles later to be undertaken. 
At sundry periods the secondary school has been supported 
chiefly as a means of preparing selected students for pro- 
fessional apprenticeship or schooling. Even to-day the 
business house which advertises for a young helper, " high 
school graduate preferred," causes parents to believe that 
in some magical way, high school education in itself and 
apart from its selective effects (which is in reality the 
result of chief importance to the employer), lays important 
foundations for specific vocational success. It is even 
widely believed that the student who, prior to his course in 
a college of medicine, law, or engineering, completes a lib- 
eral arts course in a college of general education, is thereby 
assured of greater ultimate success in his vocation. 

Does General Education Function in Vocational Compe- 
tency? — We have, at present, no satisfactory means of 
determining how far and under what conditions all that 
schooling which by common consent we now call general 
education, actually functions in vocational competency in 
particular fields. It is clear, of course, that a person who 
had never learned to read, could not, however talented, suc- 
ceed under present conditions in the practice of law. A 
bookkeeper ignorant of the multiplication table, or an 
engineer unable to solve a quadratic equation is unthink- 
able. But, taking the content of general education as now 
ordinarily accepted, we very early reach the point where it 
is impossible to do more than guess (or, easier still, to fall 
back on our entrenchments of tradition and prepossession) 
as to the connections, if any, between general studies and 
capacity for particular vocational achievement. A thou- 
sand hours spent on the study of Latin may be the best 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 73 

possible investment of that amount of time for a youth 
destined to become a Methodist preacher ; but the claim may- 
be disputed with considerable probability of success. The 
agricultural college which requires its future graduates to 
have given at least six or eight hundred hours to the study 
of French and German in secondary school or college, may 
be imposing a very questionable requirement when consid- 
ered from the standpoint of the probable professional suc- 
cess of the technical expert in agriculture. There are those 
who would require youths seeking to equip themselves to 
be gardeners or live-stock husbandmen to take courses in 
general physics and chemistry; but it is doubtful whether 
they have ever studied the actual significance, in the voca- 
tions named, of either study. In most public commercial 
schools, prospective stenographers are required to study 
bookkeeping as a vocational subject, even in large cities; 
but no available evidence proves that a stenographer in a 
large city is in general expected or desired to have this 
extra string to her bow. 

Necessary Distinctions. — For the sake of clear thinking, 
it is highly desirable that we should designate and appraise 
as vocational studies and forms of training, only those dis- 
tinctive educational procedures, the results of which can be 
demonstrated in some one of the vocations recognized and 
more or less standardized in the world of practical affairs. 
On the other hand, we should include within the category 
of general education, all those other customary or proposed 
school activities which are believed to possess value as con- 
tributing to forms of physical, moral, civic, and cultural 
well-being as these may be considered and valued largely 
apart from vocational competency. A straight back and 
well developed arm muscles are, indeed, of importance in 
many vocations ; but they are, for even greater numbers, of 
importance in living effectively apart from vocation. Hence 
educational steps taken to insure their development are to 



74 Vocational Education 

be classed properly as general education. The ability to 
read is useful in many callings and indispensable in some; 
but its importance for the various activities lying outside 
the sphere of specialized vocation — domestic, religious, 
civic, cultural — is so much greater, that the educator 
wisely insists on regarding all but some highly specialized 
forms of silent or oral reading — for proof readers, preach- 
ers, and, let us hope, teachers — as belonging to the field of 
general education. There may be some justification for 
holding that a moderate knowledge of algebra, physics, and 
chemistry is at least an important if not a necessary element 
in the instruction of those who are to constitute our " bet- 
ter educated classes "; but if requirements in these subjects 
are imposed in the name of vocational education, let us cer- 
tainly ascertain in what vocations such knowledge or other 
power functions, and under what conditions affecting or- 
ganization of subject matter and methods of instruction. 

The need of clear thinking in these matters (as well as 
clear terminologies and documented analyses) is, for two 
reasons, especially urgent in the present educational era. 
First, the movement for the development of schools for 
vocational education has assumed large proportions and 
commands new forms of public support. Secondly, the ac- 
tual educational values in general or liberal education of 
many of the traditional studies is being seriously questioned, 
especially by those who are applying in some degree the 
methods of scientific investigation in their inquiries, as a 
consequence of which the defenders of these studies hasten 
to put forth large claims as to their vocational relevancy 
or importance. French and German are widely urged and 
frequently required in the agricultural and engineering col- 
leges of America on the grounds of what is probably largely 
an artificially fostered tradition, namely, that for a substan- 
tial proportion of the specialists trained in these institu- 
tions some proficiency in these languages is a distinct voca- 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 75 

tional asset. The extent to which algebra is required in 
commercial schools is one of the curiosities in this well- 
supported division of alleged vocational education. When- 
ever the content of the curriculum of an industrial school 
is under discussion, the well meaning advocates of English 
language, literature, civics, hygiene, American history, and 
various sciences appear and urge in language very general 
and deficient in concrete instance the vocational significance 
of their favorite forms of learning. A not uncommon 
outcome of this pressure is that a school designed by its 
founders to be an effective vocational school for some 
occupation or group of occupations, and generously sup- 
ported by the public in that expectation, becomes in fact 
simply a new and often less effective form of " general " 
school, and its curriculums more or less meaningless mix- 
tures of various general and so-called practical subjects. 
This was conspicuously the case with agricultural colleges 
in their earlier years, and the weakness has by no means 
been completely remedied. To a very large extent, it 
has been true of public commercial schools, endowed and 
public "technical'' schools (of secondary grade), agricul- 
tural schools, and even industrial and domestic science 
schools. The crying evil of this situation is, of course, to 
be found in the wholesale misdirection of energy which it 
entails. These hybrid schools do not usually give a fair, 
or in any sense acceptable vocational education; they seri- 
ously misguide the pupil as regards a possible career and 
his qualifications therefor; and often they make no really 
worthy contributions towards the true and desirable ends 
of liberal or general education. 

II 

Vagueness of Objectives of General Education. — A large 
part of the confusion resulting from the efforts of well 



76 Vocational Education 

meaning citizens and educators in promoting these ill- 
defined and misdirected forms of education can be ascribed 
to the fact that educators and social economists have not 
as yet formulated either qualitatively or, far less, quan- 
titatively, the specific objectives and standards of desirable 
or feasible achievement in those fields of education which 
we vaguely call ''liberal," "cultural," "general," or "in- 
tellectual." Historically it has been natural for the schools 
to accept at their face value appraisements of the educa- 
tional values of studies made by social organizations and 
classes supposedly representing " society " in general. 
Whether the fees of parents, the gifts of philanthropists, 
or public taxation supported schools in which children were 
taught the alphabet as a means of reading the Bible, or 
other schools in which Latin was taught as foundational to 
the calling of minister or magistrate, it was not the respon- 
sibility of the school to question the wisdom of its creators. 
If many parents, whether wisely or mistakenly, insisted 
that their children have opportunity, or be required, to 
study drawing or Latin or Spanish or cube root, it was 
only human that moderately prepared, incurious, harried 
teachers and principals should say, " We will try to give 
the people what they think they want." This has been, 
commonly, the historic attitude of such purveyors to his 
majesty, the public, as druggists, editors, play-managers, 
clothiers, fiction writers, and, at times, even physicians, 
judges, and theologians. 

Furthermore, the enormous difficulties involved in trac- 
ing and evaluating the actual results to the individual and 
to society, of many specific studies have always constituted 
and still constitute a serious barrier to the making of 
workable distinctions between those outcomes of education 
which possess significance chiefly in connection with voca- 
tional achievement and those others which give qualities 
of personal culture, general intelligence, civic and moral 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 77 

behavior, and physical well-being. We can, for example, 
teach children to " draw " ; but the probable effects of such 
bits of skill or appreciation as they may acquire in the 
process on their subsequent powers, as adults, to execute 
drawings in their vocations or to exhibit taste and dis- 
crimination in their use of products embodying plastic and 
graphic art are wholly problematical. In our elementary and 
secondary schools, we devote no inconsiderable attention 
to the teaching of history, American and general; but the 
final social functioning of the knowledge of details and 
generalizations and of the sympathetic ideals and attitudes 
thus produced is as yet a most uncertain matter. 

In fact, as regards the actual or relative values of the 
studies and other activities entering into so-called gen- 
eral education from the kindergarten through the col- 
lege, we have knowledge (as distinguished from belief 
or faith) as to almost none, outside the very limited 
areas of the simple school arts of reading, spelling, 
writing, computation, and a very meager amount of geog- 
raphy and hygiene. For the rest — the kindergarten 
exercises, nature study, music, drawing, literature, his- 
tory, calisthenics, civics, advanced arithmetic, foreign 
languages, and the various sciences — we still trust 
largely to faith, our consciences eased in a degree by the 
growing vogue of freedom of '' election." This means that 
we do not yet possess standards of so evaluating these edu- 
cational means in terms of things of (relatively) final or 
ultimate human worth that we can, on the basis of these 
calculations, modify, direct, control, and test the results 
to education of particular means and methods employed. 
For example, the general conviction that it is good for 
children of say twelve years of age, to study music gives 
us no satisfactory guidance as to the kinds and character 
of music they should study or the most effective means to 
be employed in its study. What are expected to be the 



78 Vocational Education 

actual outcomes in human " values " of the study respec- 
tively of secondary school algebra, physics, English liter- 
ature ? It can hardly be contended that we have so defined 
and stated these presumptive '' outcomes " that we can 
measure against them the success attending our efforts in 
teaching them (the definite character of the purely fac- 
titious and intermediate *' ends " of " college admission " 
tests being, of course, conceded). 

The marked progress which has been made in recent 
years in defining the theory of vocational education has 
brought into relief the inadequacy of our interpretations of 
the desirable functioning of non- vocational forms of edu- 
cation. The multiplication of studies now urged for recog- 
nition in schemes of general elementary, secondary, and 
college education forces individuals and institutions con- 
stantly to make choices, but the criteria or standards for 
such choices, either in sound sociology or sound psychology, 
are shadowy in the extreme. Unquestionably the progress 
of knowledge of the social sciences should soon give us 
more substantial theories as to the valid aims of general 
education than we now find stated in educational literature. 

Fundamental Distinctions. — There is here submitted, 
tentatively and in somewhat hypothetical form, an inter- 
pretation of the respective functions of vocational and gen- 
eral education which, in the experience of the writer, can 
be of substantial service in the interests of clear thinking 
and definite practice. It is based upon the fact, easily 
grasped, that every competent adult, because of his mem- 
bership in human society, stands towards the worlds of 
nature and art in a two-fold relationship. He is, on the 
one hand, a producer of valuable service (or goods, the 
concrete embodiments of such service), which service and 
goods he exchanges almost wholly with countless others 
for the services and goods which they produce and he 
wants; and, on the other hand, he stands as a recipient, a 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 79 

utilizer, a consumer of the services and goods which he 
thus obtains in exchange. 

It is clear that each competent adult is a producer of 
service during what we call his " working " or " business " 
hours. Biblical lore ascribes to Adam responsibility for 
making it necessary that each should labor in the sweat of 
his brow; but the student of social science finds ample 
explanation of man's commitment to industry in the com- 
petitive struggle, first for existence, and later for advanced 
standards of comfort — that is, of living satisfactorily. 
Hence, in very primitive society, men produce as hunters, 
fighters (for the defender or plunderer renders his group 
service in this w^ay no less than the hunter), craftsmen, and 
the like. Later, these occupations are subdivided and added 
to almost endlessly until we find men and women, even in 
small civilized communities, who respectively render their 
service along such specialized lines as tilling the soil, teach- 
ing, building houses, repairing teeth, transporting passen- 
gers, publishing newspapers, distributing food, keeping 
roads in repair, preaching salvation, and healing the sick. 
But modern commerce also enables men to dispose of the 
products of their service at a great distance. To this same 
community are brought the products of the cofifee-grower 
in Brazil, the silk grower in China, the pottery maker in 
England, the fur hunter in Canada, the engraver in Paris, 
the writer of poetry in England, and the gold-digger of 
Australia; indeed, by means of social and mechanical de- 
vices, we are able to extend the use of a man's products to 
generations whom he will never see. The American vil- 
lage is the very real possible recipient of the services ren- 
dered to the world by Homer, Watt, Beethoven, Pasteur, 
Columbus, Arkwright, Darwin, and countless others, some 
still recalled by name, and others whose identity has long 
been lost. 

Now, while the science of economics has long differen- 



So Vocational Education 

tiated between the functions of production and consump- 
tion, the imphcations of the distinction for education have 
not been analyzed. But once we perceive that the control- 
Hng purpose of any particular form of vocational educa- 
tion is, directly and economically, to enhance the service- 
producing powers of the individual, it then becomes helpful 
to define the ends of a large portion of what we call gen- 
eral education in terms of man's capacity as a consumer, 
or, if that word connotes material things unduly, as a 
utilizer, of the services and products of service, rendered 
to him by others in exchange for the products of his service. 

General By-Education, — But at this point in the discus- 
sion of education for utilization, we are in danger of being 
misled if we fail to distinguish between the by-education 
of home, church, press, stage, and other non-school educa- 
tional agencies on the one hand, and the direct education of 
the school on the other. A child learns to care for wheaten 
bread as an article of diet through the by-education of the 
home. The better home establishes the hygienic ideal and 
practice of eating at stated intervals — meal times; while 
the poor home has not yet reached this standard in its 
by-education. Many persons learn, not through a school 
but from the by-effects of general association with their 
fellows, to care for good music, or good fiction; some thus 
learn eventually to care for poetry, paintings, essays, and 
the writings of scientists. On the other hand, it has been 
widely assumed in recent years that to insure a fairly sound 
development of taste for good reading requires the aid of 
the direct education possible only in schools. 

In other words, when we speak of education for utiliza- 
tion we must keep in mind that there are many agencies 
offering by-education to this end, and that the educational 
functions of the school are in reality residual — that is, the 
school, maintained at large expense, is expected to devote 
its efforts to meeting those important requirements of so- 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 8i 

ciety for which the various agencies of by-education are 
inadequate. Hence we do not commonly use the schools 
to teach better standards of utilization as regards moving 
pictures, contemporary fiction, popular music, transporta- 
tion, decorative clothing, sociability organizations, attrac- 
tive foods, emotional religion, newspapers, and the like. 
But to an increasing extent we are employing the direct 
education of schools to establish right standards of utiliza- 
tion of literature that is not contemporaneous or at any rate 
''popular"; of the higher grades of music and drama; of 
more hygienic and refined decorative clothing; of more 
hygienic and sanitary ways of living; of the "art" which 
is believed to count in life; of the devoted work of those 
altruists who are willing to give far more of service than 
will be given to them in return; and of all that stored 
knowledge and ideal which makes for "life more abun- 
dantly." 

The trend of civilization has long been clearly in the 
direction of narrowing and intensifying the field wherein 
any one person could be expected to render competent 
service, i.e. specialization of function; and on the other 
hand it has tended steadily towards the widening of his field 
of possible utilization as expressed in his standards of liv- 
ing, culture, and social participation. We speak of the 
former as economic specialization. It presses upon every- 
one to find and to follow assiduously a special line of pro- 
ductive work. The second tendency is the composite out- 
growth of democracy, diffusion of knowledge, diversified 
consumption, rising standards of taste. Its final product 
is the " civilized " man. 

What Gives Liberal Education? — Much confusion has 
prevailed in recent years among those who have tried to 
define and value liberal education as that is offered in school 
and college. It has not proved difficult to provide explana- 
tions in very vague and general language as to why the 



82 Vocational Education 

various branches of general learning should be made avail- 
able to all young people and even urged upon them. It 
has been held that everyone has a right to share in the 
" social inheritance " — that accumulation of knowledge, 
ideal, custom, and taste which the generations have rolled up 
with ever-increasing rapidity. We have been told in figure 
that the human spirit is an imprisoned thing looking forth 
from certain '' windows of the soul," and that it is the 
responsibility of man in his collective capacity to insure the 
entry into the soul through these windows of the fullest 
possible abundance of light. Again, it has been held by 
educational philosophers that the chief aim of general edu- 
cation in schools should be, not the acquisition of any 
specified quantum of knowledge in itself, but rather the 
mastery of those tools of intellect which would insure the 
individual the powers, after leaving school, of acquiring 
for himself, from one or many of the fields of human 
knowledge, such personal possessions as he might desire. 
A modified form of this theory is found in the belief that 
the chief function of the more advanced forms of general 
education is to be found in " mind training " — in which the 
mind is conceived as possessing points of analogy to the 
body which, in gymnasium and on athletic field, can be made 
strong, pliant, and enduring against all the needs that may 
later befall. 

But it is not apparent that these philosophical specula- 
tions as to the desirable ends of general education have 
given us the means wherewith to ascertain the comparative 
validity of the various specific ends among which choices 
must constantly be made, nor have they served to indicate 
by what methods these respective ends could be met. It is 
not apparent, for example, that the various theories thus 
far promulgated as to the desirable or feasible purposes of 
general education have aided us in determining whether 
Greek should or should not be required or urged as a factor 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 83 

in secondary or collegiate (liberal arts) education. We 
have obtained from these sources no useful criteria whereby, 
for purposes of liberal education, we could comparatively 
evaluate the study of the modern languages as against that 
of classic languages; of classical English literature against 
modern English literature; or of mathematics and the sci- 
ences against the so-called " humanities." 

Worse still, from the standpoint of educational efficiency, 
we have obtained little or no assistance in determining what 
constitutes, or should constitute for any commonly accepted 
division of knowledge or training, optimum quantities or 
areas. What shall we accept, in chemistry, for example, 
as a desirable and practicable amount of knowledge or 
other mastery to be required or encouraged? What posi- 
tion and what scope shall we give in secondary school and 
college to music? art? ancient history? oriental languages? 
translations or classic literatures ? contemporary events, his- 
tory in the making? We are still wanting a theory of the 
purposes of general education sufficiently definite and serv- 
iceable to enable us to procure, on the basis of it, answers 
to questions like these. 

The theory set forth above — namely, that general educa- 
tion should be interpreted chiefly from the standpoint of the 
needs of man as a utilizer rather than as a producer — 
needs, of course, extended analysis at numerous points. 
Certain of the earlier disciplines of the elementary schools 
— notably reading, writing, and numbers — commonly func- 
tion visibly among the efficiencies of man, both as a pro- 
ducer and as a utilizer. But the primary justification for 
their inclusion in programs of general education is, of 
course, their fundamental importance to good utilization. 

Again it is apparent that one indispensable element in 
sound vocational education is trained power of utilization 
of those materials which serve in production. The expert 
mechanic must make use of some phases of mathematics, 



^4 Vocational Education 

drawing, mechanics, and other so-called technical studies. 
He requires certain definable powers of discrimination and 
evaluation in choosing his tools, materials, and other work- 
ing conditions. He can usually employ to advantage any 
and all knowledge he may possess as to accounting, laws 
affecting contracts, prevailing market conditions of mate- 
rials and labor, recent labor-saving inventions, etc. In 
these special fields, then, he must be an effective utilizer. 
But, for most vocations, these fields occupy but a small 
area in contrast with the non-vocational fields of utilization 
with which he should be concerned. Training a person 
towards sound utilization within his expected vocational field 
is, of course, a necessary and feasible part of vocational 
education. Much of the education required for this pur- 
pose — the accumulation of wide technical knowledge, the 
fixing of right standards of taste and discrimination, the 
building up of ideals — will in reality accrue as by-education 
accompanying the development of skill in, and concrete ex- 
perience with, productive work. 

Education for Utilization. — A more fundamental ques- 
tion left, thus far, unanswered, requires an interpretation 
of what we mean by '' education for utilization." We have 
already seen that the by-education of home, street, and 
other private agencies accomplishes much in preparing 
youth to be utilizers. What is or should be the actual 
residual function of school and college? 

We note, in the first place, that utilization, like produc- 
tion, has its social, no less than its more easily perceived 
individual, conditions and consequences. Low standards 
of utilization in art, music, fiction, decorative apparel, bev- 
erages, travel, and companionship may, conceivably, not 
harm a particular individual or make of him less of a man 
than he might otherwise be; but the contagion of his ex- 
ample may be capable of working a social injury. Again, 
it is a well-known axiom of the commercial world that 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 85 

demand greatly affects, when it does not completely deter- 
mine, supply. Every additional buyer of mendacious news- 
papers strengthens their position and correspondingly weak- 
ens that of the more reputable press. The undiscriminat- 
ing buyer of packed foods places a persistent premium on 
adulteration, misbranding, and unstandardized production. 
The man who is complacently indifferent to the world's 
accumulation of scientific knowledge is making it harder to 
add to that knowledge in the future. The woman who 
seeks, in the purchase of clothing, only her personal satis- 
factions, may be placing a large premium upon goods pro- 
duced and sold under bad conditions. She thus handicaps 
all efforts to raise standards of production and exchange. 
The man who takes no pains to choose between competent 
and incompetent medical service is giving to quackery a 
large advantage in the competitive struggle which always 
goes on between scientific and pseudo-scientific medicine. 
The voter who is satisfied if the employee — congressman, 
sheriff, waterworks engineer, teacher, policeman — whom 
he, in common with his fellow voters, elects for the per- 
formance of important public tasks, is merely a " good 
fellow," an approved member of the " gang," is, by his 
own complacency and low standards heavily handicapping 
the public service and deferring indefinitely the day of 
cleaner politics. 

In all departments of human utilization, — religion, sci- 
ence, history, literature, dress, foods, exercise, housing, 
companionship, places of residence, expert service, lan- 
guage, politics, and the like, — incessant competition pre- 
vails between high and low standards, whether these be 
viewed from the standpoint of the immediate apparent wel- 
fare of the individual or from that of the larger well-being 
in which the society of which the individual is a member 
has interests no less than himself. The gradual develop- 
ment of direct education through schools as a means of 



86 Vocational Education 

insuring higher and more social standards of utilization is 
clearly in accordance with sound social economy. Hence, 
the fatuity of the assertions, sometimes made even by edu- 
cators, that we need less of so-called liberal education and 
more of vocational education (" in schools," being meant in 
each instance). As standards of living improve, as man 
emerges into a true civilization, we shall ever need more 
extensive and better organized liberal education. Equally, 
however, we shall need in increasing amounts and varieties, 
vocational education in proper season for many if not for 
all those prospective producers whose equipment for voca- 
tional activities cannot readily be procured through the by- 
education of home, shop, office, or farm. 

Much of the present prevailing confusion in educational 
thinking is unquestionably due to our failure adequately to 
distinguish between cultural and vocational aims. Practical 
men are still accustomed to look for the fruits of general 
secondary or college education in the forms of vocational 
competency. Does a college education pay? Business men 
and educators debate this question, naively assuming that 
a primary purpose in a liberal arts college course should be 
an equipment wherewith to earn a living. The obvious 
reply, of course, should be that it is no purpose of a college 
course to equip a man to earn a living, hence it is unwar- 
rantable to try to gauge the success of a college education 
in these terms. If evidence were available, it would un- 
doubtedly show that college men in general " succeed," in 
the economic sense of that term, to a greater extent than 
non-college men, just as high school graduates doubtless 
succeed better than their fellows who have not entered, 
or, having entered, have not completed, a high school 
course. But to assume that such success is in consider- 
able degree to be attributed to their direct education ob- 
tained in these institutions is to indulge in rankest 
form in that species of fallacious reasoning denoted by 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 87 

the phrase ''post hoc, ergo propter hoc." It is patent 
to any observer, of course, that in the statistical sense, 
only the biologically, psychologically, and sociologically 
best of our people — best, that is, as respects native 
abilities, results of early environment, effects of the 
by-education of home, street, church, etc. — enter the 
high school; of these only a still more select superior 
class graduate; and of these in turn, only the few of 
most promise (on the whole) graduate from college. 
Generally speaking, success is the destined lot of these 
superior persons, quite regardless of the kind of general 
education they have received. 

Illusions of Mental Discipline. — As a matter of fact, 
much existing confusion regarding the possible functioning 
of general education derives also from the insecure educa- 
tional foundations long ago laid in the quicksands of the 
so-called '' faculty psychology." The will-o'-the-wisp of 
mental discipline has allured into the bogs of educational 
mysticism at one time or another nearly all educators. The 
delusion originates somewhat as follows : a given subject 
of study or training (a favorite with the proponent, of 
course) , — e.g. Latin, algebra, mechanical drawing, joinery, 
stenography, physics, hygiene, music. Browning, eugenics, 
— requires for its effective mastery close application, organ- 
ized effort, and vigorous and sustained use of the " mental 
powers " — the memory, observation, concentration, logical 
reasoning, imagination, appreciation of scientific method, 
etc., etc., of the older psychologists. This favorite subject 
in fact appears to require the exercise and development of 
these powers almost more than any other subject known to 
the proponent; hence, ahogether apart from its value as 
contributing to the building of useful or interesting knowl- 
edge, tastes, skill, and ideals, it seems to him to be an 
unequaled subject for the discipline of the mind. But the 
disciplined mind is fundamental to all forms of success in 



88 Vocational Education 

life, — cultural, vocational, civic. Hence, even if its " con- 
tent " value is insignificant, the aforesaid favorite subject 
should be given prominent place, should even be required 
of all students because of its virtues as a mental gymnastic. 
The " trained mind "of course, functions no less certainly 
in business and other practical affairs than in the less 
materialistic commitments entailed by membership in civi- 
lized society. Hence the persistence of fallacies as to the 
bearings of the disciplinary studies of school and college on 
" practical," i.e. vocational activities. 

It is only when we come to inquire in all seriousness 
whether " mental training," " mental discipline," the 
'' trained mind " and other phrasings of the same concep- 
tion, denote realities with which educational processes as 
now organized can deal that we are confronted by the 
utterly factitious character of much of the so-called think- 
ing which has heretofore prevailed in this field. It is only 
when we find that the world recognizes under each of the 
vague generic concepts, expressed by such phrases as " rea- 
soning power," '' memory," " observation," " imagination," 
" scientific method," " enthusiasm," " analysis," a whole 
host of possible highly specialized powers, some useful, 
some ornamental, some useless, but in many cases quite 
unrelated to each other, that we begin to get our feet on to 
the solid grounds of reality. We then find that there is 
a large variety of specific mental powers and other acqui- 
sitions which can be acquired through the customary pro- 
cesses of general education and which have an important 
place in personal culture or civic capacity (two useful sub- 
divisions of liberal education or, as here interpreted, 
education for utilization), but which have no discernible 
relation to vocational competency. Vice versa, it is pos- 
sible to enumerate in the constitution of any individual 
adult, a large variety of special mental attributes of the 
utmost importance in vocational competency, but which 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 89 

are only remotely related to personal culture or civic 
capacity. Close analytical thinking in the directions here 
indicated will do much to dispel some of the fogs of illu- 
sion which have darkened the way of progressive measures 
toward a truly modern liberal education and which have 
equally retarded in a score of ways the evolution of systems 
of effective vocational education. 

The " Vestibule " Conception. — Men and women whose 
experiences and prepossessions relative to '' education " 
have been developed almost exclusively in connection with 
'' academic " or ^' general " education are prone to think of 
vocational schools as extensions upward from schools of 
general elementary, secondary or collegiate education. For 
practical purposes such a conception is much less useful and 
is more misleading than that which regards any particular 
type of vocational school as an extension downward from, 
or as a vestihuled approach to, a specified vocation itself. 

Many vocations require such maturity on the part of 
their entrants that no direct connection can be established 
between the school of general education and the vocational 
school. For example, men do not usually become locomo- 
tive engineers, policemen, sailors, traveling salesmen, street 
car conductors, farmers or school principals on, or soon 
after, leaving schools in which they have received their 
general education. On the other hand, custom, at least, 
has established that lawyers, physicians and teachers can 
and should begin their vocational education immediately 
at the close of their respective periods of liberal education. 
A very large proportion of operative positions in factories 
are open only to mature workers, although in many cases 
presupposing no " promotional " approach through stages 
of work suited to younger hands. 

Of similar nature is the vocation of homemaker. As 
shown elsewhere in some detail, American women are rarely 
ready to enter a genuine vocational school of homemaking 



90 Vocational Education 

at the close of (a) the elementary school period for the 
least able and prosperous, or (b) at sixteen for the slightly 
more able and prosperous, or (c) at eighteen or twenty-two 
for the economically superior classes. For the large ma- 
jority of urban girls at least, several years will usually 
elapse between the close of general schooling and entry 
upon '' full responsibility " homemaking. 

In all these cases, it is obviously more practicable and 
serviceable, in planning for vocational education, to think 
first of the vocation itself — its scope, the usual age of 
entry upon it, its requirements of age, physical strength and 
other qualities to be obtained by selection — and from this 
point of vantage to decide upon the place and character of 
a suitable vocational school. 

Under these conditions, liberal or general schooling will 
long antedate vocational schooling. In fact it is probable 
that, given an abundant supply of facilities for vocational 
education, the life history of many workers will be as 
follows: Stage I (age 6-14), full time general education. 
Stage II (age 14-16), full time general education. Stage 
III (age 16), one third year to full time vocational education 
for juvenile specialty, with " extension " general education in 
evening. Stage IV (age 16-19), juvenile full time employ- 
ment, cultural education in evening. Stage V (age 19-20), 
one third or one half year of full time training for " man- 
hood " specialty or " upgrading " work. Stage VI, wage- 
earning employment, with evening and other extension 
improvement or upgrading courses. Of course the youth 
should be urged (eventually required) to remain in school 
of general education as long as it is clearly profitable (to 
society or to himself) to do so. 

Can There be " General Vocational " Education? — Many 
educators are seeking the philosopher's stone in vocational 
education — the one precious means that, reversing the 
alchemist's dreamed-of process, will transmute ordinary 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 91 

school instruction and training into any one of hundreds 
of special forms of vocational competency. At least they 
hope to find one panacea to produce "agricultural" com- 
petency; another to produce "industrial" power; and a 
third to provide education for " business life." These edu- 
cators have to serve the " small community " ; they perceive 
easily enough that local youths growing up in the vicinity 
will want to disperse into scores of vocations, for each of 
which it is utterly futile to provide special vocational schools 
locally. 

Hence one quest is for subjects of study common to many 
vocations. Why not teach " shop mathematics," " busi- 
ness English," " agricultural science " ? Another is for a 
composite course to prepare young men to be " all round " 
or general mechanics as these are supposed to be needed in 
rural and village communities. 

The probability seems strong that very little hope exists 
for " general vocational " education of any sort. There 
are several reasons for this. First and most important is 
the fact that in proportion as we seek common elements or 
factors in vocational competency we move rapidly towards 
the abstract and general. For example, tailoring, sheet 
metal work, and carpentry, each requires special mathe- 
matics; but to teach a common shop mathematics for these 
three trades we must either teach the special mathematics of 
three different trades to people who will require only that 
of one, or else teach a mathematics that will differ little from 
general mathematics and will prove just as remote from real 
life and difficult for the average student to apply. Doubt- 
less there are common elements in the special sciences that 
underlie machine shop practice, printing, and electrical 
work; but these common elements are too abstract and 
elusive for the average " thing minded " learner. Doubt- 
less, too, the logical thinker among educators can discover 
many common elements in the mechanical drawing re- 



94 Vocational Education 

tiated education of greater value to the individual and to 
society, for such value depends largely upon the extent to 
which the individual pursues the curriculum best suited to 
his needs. This factor is of prime importance, although 
frequently ignored in discussions regarding the effective- 
ness of vocational and other types of differentiated edu- 
cation." . . . 

What is Genuine Vocational Education? — In the estima- 
tion of the present writer^ the report of the commission 
almost completely misses the significance of the contem- 
porary movement for the extension of vocational educa- 
tion in schools. The apparent failure of the commission 
to take account of available sociological and especially eco- 
nomic guidance in this field of education is almost disas- 
trous because it warps their underlying principles at almost 
every point. To an educator who has tried to comprehend 
the sociological and psychological significance of the cur- 
rent demands for better vocational education, the entire 
philosophy of the report seems almost hopelessly academic 
in the unfavorable sense as it relates to vocational educa- 
tion. (The writer is not aware that any one of the mem- 
bers-at-large of the reviewing committee has at all identified 
himself with recent movements for vocational education; 
and he wonders how closely the three chairmen of the 
vocational committees scrutinized the " cardinal princi- 
ples " before approving them. ) 

It is difiQcult to believe that the committee gave close 
consideration either to the history of the evolution of school 
vocational education as thus far developed, or to the stand- 
ards and conditions affecting the more than two thousand 
vocations now followed by juvenile and adult workers in 
the United States. 

1 The material of this section first appeared as an article. The 
somewhat controversial form has been retained as a matter of conven- 
ience. 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 95 

It will generally be conceded that effective vocational 
education through schools (that is, instruction and train- 
ing sufficient to guarantee successful practice of the voca- 
tion under commercial conditions without subsequent 
period of apprenticeship) is now found only for such voca- 
tions as those of the physician, dentist, pharmacist, veter- 
inary surgeon, mining engineer, surveyor, nurse, elementary 
school teacher, stenographer, naval ensign and army lieu- 
tenant. School training for these vocations now proceeds 
in accordance with determinate standards. In most cases 
definite goals of attainment are set. The instruction and 
training are basic, not merely extension. Conditions and 
standards of practical achievement, no less than related 
technical and social studies, have been established as part 
of the educational process. 

Now it seems to have escaped the attention of the com- 
mittee that the modern movement for vocational education 
rests essentially on social needs and demands that schools 
shall be provided wherein young men and women may be 
trained for several hundred different vocations no less 
effectively than are persons trained for the dozen enumer- 
ated above. From the psychological point of view there 
is not the slightest reason why suitably qualified persons 
should not, through special schools, be trained effectively 
for such vocations as tailoring, jewelry salesmanship, poul- 
try farming, coal cutting, stationary engine firing, waiting 
on table (hotel), cutting (in shoe factory), automobile re- 
pair, teaching of French in secondary school, mule spinning, 
power machine operating (for ready made clothing), raisin 
grape growing, general farming suited to Minnesota, lino- 
type composition, railway telegraphy, autogenous welding, 
street car motor driving, and a hundred others. 

And from the sociological point of view, taking account 
sometimes of the needs of society (the end that prompts 
the establishment at public or philanthropic expense of nor- 



96 Vocational Education 

mal schools, military academies, and nurses' training 
schools) or of the needs of the individual who must be 
helped to acquire competency to practice a vocation for 
self-support (the end that prompts the support, often on a 
purely commercial basis, of schools for stenography, law, 
mining engineering, and automobile driving) there may be 
exactly as good, if not better, reasons for the provision of 
vocational schools for these heretofore unsupplied fields 
as for those for which vocational schools were earlier de- 
veloped. 

Unreal Vocational Education. — It is possible that the 
committee has been confused by the numberless attempts 
in recent years to realize some of the supposed ends of 
vocational education through courses giving information 
about vocations or through courses supposed to provide for 
the inferred needs on the part of workers for technical 
knowledge anticipatory to practical participation in the pro- 
ductive work of the calling itself. The hundreds of pro- 
grams of vocational extension education now provided in 
evening and other schools, especially for the agricultural 
and handicraft callings, are of course worthy of the highest 
approval; but these have nothing in common with the hun- 
dreds of other attempts made in recent years to teach from 
books, supplemented by a little laboratory illustration, the 
principles of farming, electricity, shop mathematics, me- 
chanical drawing, commercial law, home economics, book- 
keeping, woodworking, counter salesmanship, printing, and 
dressmaking to young persons long before these learners 
have actually entered upon the initial practice of their call- 
ings and often before they have consciously differentiated 
callings which they really expect to follow. The number- 
less attempts of school men, pressed by public demands 
for vocational education in the interests either of individ- 
ual youth or the productive needs of the community, to offer 
the foregoing substitutes for genuine vocational education 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 97 

have done much to prejudice all bona fide proposals for 
vocational education under the auspices of the established 
public school authorities. 

The educational philosophy of the committee leads to 
the remarkable proposal that the basis for the differentia- 
tion of the curricula of the senior high school should be 
vocational — '' In the broad sense of the term " — '' thus 
justifying the names commonly given such as agricultural, 
business, clerical, industrial, fine arts, and household arts 
curriculums." But " provision should be made also for 
those having distinctively academic interests and needs." 

Once, indeed, in the report, we find a statement of the 
purpose of vocational education that can be approved, 
" Vocational education should equip the individual to secure 
a livelihood for himself and those dependent on him, etc." 
But within twenty lines we find " the extent to which the 
{sic) secondary school should offer training for specific 
vocation depends upon the vocation, the facilities that the 
{sic) school can acquire, and the opportunity that the pupil 
may have to obtain such training later." Is this to be 
interpreted as meaning that the committee would ban all 
public school vocational education that could not con- 
veniently be brought within its '^ comprehensive high 
school "? No one doubts, for example, that if the methods 
of apprenticeship should one day be found manifestly unsat- 
isfactory as means of training men to be locomotive engi- 
neers, it would be entirely practicable to establish in the 
United States a half dozen schools that would do that work 
no less effectively than schools for dentists or schools for 
nurses now do their work. Is there any question as to 
whether such schools could obtain needed facilities ? A few 
score miles of track, a hundred locomotives, a couple of 
repair shops, a half dozen class rooms, and working part- 
time arrangements with a few neighboring railroads — 
these would be sufficient. Such schools could apply enter- 



98 Vocational Education 

ing tests, could base technical knowledge on practice, could 
easily impart social and health insight and standards, and 
could graduate locomotive drivers tested and certificated no 
less than are now ensigns and pharmacists. 

But if we tried to teach this calling in a comprehensive 
high school it would, of course, be difficult to provide all 
facilities. We could restrict admission to those over 20 
years of age; we could perhaps get a second-hand locomo- 
tive and 30 feet of track into a basement room; and of 
course we could also provide a nice library and some elab- 
orate drawings. But with all that would not the practical 
man say we were playing at the job instead of working 
at it? The committee does say that only men should teach 
in a given field who are skilled in productive work in that 
field; and that " the actual conditions of the vocation should 
be utilized either within the high school or in cooperation 
with the home, farm, shop or office.." But all of this is 
still very indeterminate until it has been analyzed in terms 
of at least a few hundred of the typical vocations which 
men and women now follow. The committee should in 
any future elaboration of its cardinal principles procure the 
cooperation of a few persons who can apply sociological 
methods to the determination of the specific aims, place, 
content, and methods of several hundred types of vocational 
education. As a matter of fact these methods are now 
much more readily applicable to the discovery and for- 
mulation of programs of vocational education than to the 
specific objectives to be provided under any of the other 
main objectives set forth by the committee. 

The Vocational Survey. — The method would be applied 
somewhat as follows : A vocational survey of a given com- 
munity shows that there are represented among others the 
following vocations (the workers being between twenty 
and fifty years of age and therefore past the usual stages 
of apprenticeship) : 100 women stenographers of whom 20 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 99 

can be rated good on a scale of *' excellent," '' good," " fair," 
''poor" (standards being found partly in earning power 
and partly in general proficiency independent of immediate 
earning power); 20 dentists, 10 good; 200 grocers' clerks, 
60 good; 40 handicraft tailors, 15 good; 500 homemakers 
on budgets of $800-$ 1,200 per year (average four children, 
living in detached house), 260 good; 30 journeymen bar- 
bers, 20 good; 10 trained nurses, 8 good; 40 hotel wait- 
resses, 10 good; 100 factory specialists in furniture making, 
20 good; 200 factory specialists on ready made children's 
clothing, 60 good; 20 market gardeners (owners and '' full 
responsibihty " tenants), 3 good; 20 elevator girls (18-25), 
5 good; 50 normal school trained elementary teachers, 28 
good; 5 high school teachers of history, 2 good; etc. 

With regard to each of these various vocations educa- 
tional sociology at once proceeds to ask: (a) Have the 
methods of vocational education (mostly non-school, of 
course) by which all the foregoing workers (the excellent, 
the good, the fair, and the poor) reached their present pro- 
ficiency been quantitatively sufficient to provide society with 
sufficient productive service in these respective fields? (&) 
Have these methods been such as to provide a reasonable 
number of openings for that army of youth looking for op- 
portunity to participate in the world's work and who nor- 
mally strive forward into these callings? For it is cer- 
tain that in a crowded world and a dynamic social order and 
a democratic civilization ambitious individuals must, within 
reasonable limits, be permitted to "crowd" for places or 
to make them, otherwise we shall have large occupationless 
classes, excluded from monopolized vocations, (c) Have 
the methods by which the "good" workers (and, making 
allowance for hereditary advantages, no less the "excel- 
lent") reached their present proficiency been reasonably 
expeditious, humane, unwasteful, vocationally effective, and 
not productive of harmful physical, civic, domestic, and cul- 
tural by-products ? 



lOo Vocational Education 

For example, it might be found that present methods of 
getting waitresses and elementary school teachers are rea- 
sonably good, judged by the standards that could be estab- 
lished under the foregoing questions; that the methods of 
getting poultry farmers, dentists, and handicraft tailors 
do not give enough of such workers; that the methods of 
providing nurses and furniture factory specialists are good, 
but too exclusive, since they deprive some persons of 
opportunities to enter and compete for a livelihood in these 
fields. 

The facts thus assembled give us a basis for the evalua- 
tion, in terms of various practicable standards, of existing 
methods of vocational education. The fundamental ques- 
tion now is : What can, and what shall we do for the train- 
ing of the next generation of workers in each of these fields? 
This question immediately resolves itself into three ques- 
tions: (a) Where, for a given calling, vocational edu- 
cation has heretofore been chiefly by-education (a by- 
product of participation in productive work) what can 
be done by society, possibly acting through the state, 
to improve it while still leaving it as by-education? 
(b) Where methods of by-education are demonstrably 
ineffective or wasteful of human well-being, as is the case 
in the writer's estimation with a large majority of the more 
than 2000 distinctive vocations now followed by Amer- 
icans, when and where and how can we provide means of 
direct vocational education (that is, specific vocational 
schools) for these callings? (c) Where direct vocational 
education now controls in filling certain callings — e.g. sur- 
veying, electrical engineering, soil analysis, bookkeeping, 
and law -— if it is found that results are wasteful or other- 
wise ineffective, what shall be done to improve the existing 
vocational schools? 

In the study of many callings, certainly, we are soon 
forced to conclude that effective vocational education for 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education loi 

the future can only be given through specially designed 
agencies for that purpose. Here, then, begins the quest of 
standards for such education as applies to particular call- 
ings. Reaching this point, the man of academic possession 
almost certainly falls back on a carefully cherished set of 
a priori principles. He loathes the task of being held to 
consideration of a specified calling. Ask him, as the out- 
come of the inquiries suggested above, how he would pro- 
ceed to devise programs of direct (vocational school) edu- 
cation for, respectively, barbers, farmers producing milk as 
a major and apples as a minor income crop, cooks for small 
hotels, marine firemen, field salesmen of drugs, reporters, 
telephone linemen, country newspaper editors, pressmen in 
book and newspaper printing, tobacco growers (as major), 
bank cashiers, vampers in shoe factories, moving picture 
operators, and homemakers on budgets of $700 to $1,000 — 
in the event that the ineffectiveness of the non-school meth- 
ods of vocational education heretofore followed can be 
demonstrated — and he is at once balked. For what ages 
should vocational schools for each of these vocations be 
available? Why? For which sex if not both? Why? 
What should be prerequisites for admission? Why? 
What should be the length and character of practical train- 
ing through productive work? Why? What should be 
the length and character of short or long courses or related 
technical, social, and physical education? Why? What 
should be standards of completion of training, of gradua- 
tion, of approval for employment? What should be the 
expected or guaranteed character of subsequent non-school 
vocational education ? Why ? What should be the character 
of expected or guaranteed opportunities for subsequent ex- 
tension education ? Why ? What should be the expected or 
guaranteed opportunities for promotional or other upgrad- 
ing education ? Why ? 



I02 Vocational Education 

Vocational Education vs. Civic Education. — A very con- 
siderable part of the confusion of the committee as regards 
vocational education can be attributed to its failure to dis- 
tinguish between the study of vocations for the purpose of 
civic understanding, guidance, and cultural enlightenment, 
and the vStudy of (and productive practice in) given voca- 
tions for the sake of becoming efficient producers. 

" Furthermore, it is only as the pupil sees his vocation 
in the light of his citizenship and his citizenship in the light 
of his vocation that he will be prepared for effective mem- 
bership in an industrial democracy," says the report. This 
is somewhat mystical because so few of us yet understand 
what is meant by industrial democracy. Are the peoples 
of Vermont, Texas, Massachusetts, Boston, Bridgeport 
parts of industrial democracy? Are the physicians, orange 
growers, bank clerks, factory shoemakers, school teachers, 
street car motormen, editors, coal miners, colored cotton 
growers, department store clerks, all (or any of them) 
members of an industrial democracy? 

There can be no question as to the righteousness of the 
ideal underlying the committee's contention, if we waive 
the difficult implications of the words " industrial democ- 
racy." Every man should see as fully as practicable the 
relationship of his vocation not only to his citizenship, but 
to his domestic life, his health, his religion, and his personal 
culture. 

In part these interconnections can be studied in connection 
with the vocational guidance, the practical arts practice, and 
study of the civic or social order, all of which are factors 
in the liberal education which is the legitimate purpose — 
the central obligation in fact — of the liberal arts secondary 
schools to supply to all pupils as long as they can be induced 
to remain in that school. 

On the other hand, any genuine vocational school (e.g. 
in medicine, elementary school teaching, stenography) now 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 103 

instructs its students in the physical and social knowledge 
and especially in appreciations that are significant and perti- 
nent to the vocation being learned, all of which must 
of course differ from one vocation to another. These are 
two perfectly practical lines of approach to the interrelation 
of objectives desired by the committee. But until we can 
see some of the practical programs exemplifying the com- 
mittee's somewhat vague, if not mystical, proposals, we 
shall hardly know whether what they have in their minds 
involves training for the successful practice of vocations 
or merely some controlled development towards apprecia- 
tion of vocations. 

We should all greatly like to bring it about, of course, 
that lawyers and factory hands, coal miners and bank clerks, 
waitresses and nurses, elementary school teachers and de- 
partment store clerks, could and would meet always together 
in club and home on terms of friendly equality and fullest 
mutual understanding. If the committee thinks it can 
achieve these results or contribute to them by refusing to 
approve any supposed divorce (which probably does not 
exist now in any well developed system of school vocational 
education) of social-civic education from vocational educa- 
tion, then the end would certainly justify substantial sacri- 
fices. But we have much to learn as to necessary limitations 
of the two types of education from those vocational 
schools that are provided for our people of greatest ability 
— - our military academies, engineering schools, law schools, 
normal schools, colleges of medicine and of dentistry! 

The members of the committee are chiefly, and rightly, 
occupied with the liberal education of youth of secondary 
school age. They cannot, however, ignore the growing 
strength of motives for vocational participation manifested 
during these years of adolescence. Hence it would seem 
that they desire to seize upon these vocational motives and 
use them as means of furthering liberal education, even 



I02 



Vocational Education 



Vocational Education vs. Civic Education. — A very con- 
siderable part of the confusion of the committee as regards 
vocational education can be attributed to its failure to dis- 
tinguish between the study of vocations for the purpose of 
civic understanding, guidance, and cultural enlightenment, 
and the study of (and productive practice in) given voca- 
tions for the sake of becoming efficient producers. 

" Furthermore, it is only as the pupil sees his vocation 
in the light of his citizenship and his citizenship in the light 
of his vocation that he will be prepared for effective mem- 
bership in an industrial democracy," says the report. This 
is somewhat mystical because so few of us yet understand 
what is meant by industrial democracy. Are the peoples 
of Vermont, Texas, Massachusetts, Boston, Bridgeport 
parts of industrial democracy? Are the physicians, orange 
growers, bank clerks, factory shoemakers, school teachers, 
street car motormen, editors, coal miners, colored cotton 
growers, department store clerks, all (or any of them) 
members of an industrial democracy? 

There can be no question as to the righteousness of the 
ideal underlying the committee's contention, if we waive 
the difficult implications of the words " industrial democ- 
racy." Every man should see as fully as practicable the 
relationship of his vocation not only to his citizenship, but 
to his domestic life, his health, his religion, and his personal 
culture. 

In part these interconnections can be studied in connection 
with the vocational guidance, the practical arts practice, and 
study of the civic or social order, all of which are factors 
in the liberal education which is the legitimate purpose — 
the central obligation in fact — of the liberal arts secondary 
schools to supply to all pupils as long as they can be induced 
to remain in that school. 

On the other hand, any genuine vocational school (e.g. 
in medicine, elementary school teaching, stenography) now 



The Relation of General to Vocational Education 103 

instructs its students in the physical and social knowledge 
and especially in appreciations that are significant and perti- 
nent to the vocation being learned, all of which must 
of course differ from one vocation to another. These are 
two perfectly practical lines of approach to the interrelation 
of objectives desired by the committee. But until we can 
see some of the practical programs exemplifying the com- 
mittee's somewhat vague, if not mystical, proposals, we 
shall hardly know whether what they have in their minds 
involves training for the successful practice of vocations 
or merely some controlled development towards apprecia- 
tion of vocations. 

We should all greatly like to bring it about, of course, 
that lawyers and factory hands, coal miners and bank clerks, 
waitresses and nurses, elementary school teachers and de- 
partment store clerks, could and would meet always together 
in club and home on terms of friendly equality and fullest 
mutual understanding. If the committee thinks it can 
achieve these results or contribute to them by refusing to 
approve any supposed divorce (which probably does not 
exist now in any well developed system of school vocational 
education) of social-civic education from vocational educa- 
tion, then the end would certainly justify substantial sacri- 
fices. But we have much to learn as to necessary limitations 
of the two types of education from those vocational 
schools that are provided for our people of greatest ability 
— - our military academies, engineering schools, law schools, 
normal schools, colleges of medicine and of dentistry ! 

The members of the committee are chiefly, and rightly, 
occupied with the liberal education of youth of secondary 
school age. They cannot, however, ignore the growing 
strength of motives for vocational participation manifested 
during these years of adolescence. Hence it would seem 
that they desire to seize upon these vocational motives and 
use them as means of furthering liberal education, even 



I04 Vocational Education 

though the expectations of the large majority of pupils 
might be disappointed and their energies misdirected in the 
process. The committee favors the subordination of de- 
ferred values, and yet, from the standpoint of the critic 
it seems actually to sacrifice present values to values almost 
indefinitely deferred where genuine vocational education is 
involved. 

In spite of its seeming insistence to the contrary it is 
hard to believe that the committee is genuinely interested 
in any vocational education that can meet the economic 
tests of our time. Nowhere does it employ the language 
or the illustrations accepted in current discussion of voca- 
tional education. Hardly at all does it allude to the social 
demands that are pressing vocational education forward as 
one of the large movements in social economy. Towards 
all current problems, intricate and baffling, of vocational 
education the committee maintains a serene scholastic aloof- 
ness, possibly the same slightly contemptuous indifference 
which characterized the attitude of our scholastic forbears 
towards manual labor in general. At least the committee 
can have only itself to blame if it gives that impression to 
many readers. 

The foregoing criticism must not be interpreted as an 
expression of opposition to the commission's general find- 
ings as to the need of more extended and better secondary 
education of all sorts. It is simply a protest against the 
impracticability of the submitted proposals to provide so- 
called vocational education in " comprehensive high 
schools." Such procedure may result in prolonged general 
education but it will give no sound vocational education. 



CHAPTER IV 

PRINCIPLES OF METHOD IN VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 

The Imperfect Science of Educational Methods. — Back of 
all educational practices lies a multitude of special and, cer- 
tainly, a number of general pedagogical principles. In their 
fundamental aspects, obviously, these must rest on the psy- 
chology of learning; but in many of their derivative aspects 
they rest also on social and administrative conditions. 

The pedagogical principles of non-vocational education 
are as yet only partially understood. In producing the skills 
involved in the primary school arts — reading, writing, num- 
bers — teachers have long known the values of repetition, 
drill, and concentration. Lately they have come to attach 
value to motives of attraction rather than compulsion. And 
it is now an accepted principle in all good training that the 
realistic associations and values of the step in the process 
should, in the interests of effective learning, be well compre- 
hended as well as approved by the learner. 

But when we get beyond the elementary stages of general 
education our grasp of principles is still very meager and 
unsatisfactory. We know almost nothing of the principles 
to be followed in making moral education effective under 
present-day conditions. We talk endlessly about training 
our pupils " to think " but when analysis reveals the illusory 
character of some cherished panacea we have no reserves 
as yet to fall back upon. In accordance with what prin- 
ciples can we produce the " appreciations " of literature, 
music, plastic art? We can only make surmises as yet. 
How shall we proceed to make of the youth of fourteen a 

los 



io6 Vocational Education 

" good citizen " against his voting days at twenty-one? We 
still flounder amidst, guesses and random experiments. 

Hence it need not surprise us to find how few and unsub- 
stantial are our " principles "of method for vocational edu- 
cation in schools. Even in the professional colleges where 
trial-and-error discovery of methods has been proceeding, in 
some cases for centuries, pedagogic practices are largely 
based upon customary methods and means which always 
tend to become '' traditional " in the strict sense of the term 
— that is, " handed on " by processes of imitation, and un- 
critically. 

Nevertheless it is practicable to derive empirically cer- 
tain tenta.tive principles which can help in practice. Even- 
tually we may expect the psychologists to give us the materi- 
als for reasonably scientific methods, both of general and of 
particular application. 

I 

General Analysis. — 1. The word '* method" is here used 
in a comprehensive sense as covering the more specific means 
and methods, apart from administration and organization, 
of realizing a stated aim in education. Effective educa- 
tional procedure presupposes clear-cut definitions of ulti- 
mate aims and then of proximate aims to be realized ; analy- 
sis of the necessary means and methods by which they are 
to be realized; the provision of an organization and admin- 
istrative control adequate to the handling of these necessary 
means and methods ; practice or procedure in realizing aims ; 
and finally, the testing of results, the realization of which 
has been contemplated from the start. 

2. It can well be assumed that, in the main, effective 
methods in a particular field of vocational education can best 
be derived primarily from study of the vocation in which 
proficiency is sought. In other words, each distinctive field 
of vocational education may be expected gradually to de- 
velop an extensive system of special method. Already in 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 107 

schools for the training of lawyers, dentists, agricultural ex- 
perts, electrical engineers, elementary school teachers, tele- 
phone switchboard operators, stenographers, and military 
leaders, a very extensive methodology has been evolved. 
Equally, it may be expected that in schools for the training 
of loom tenders, spinners, cutters in shoemaking, screwmak- 
ers, motormen, counter-salesmen, gardeners, homemakers, 
power-operators in cloth manufacturing and the like, in 
every case a special methodology will be provided. 

3. Nevertheless, following the analogy of other fields of 
education, it should be possible also to state certain general 
principles probably applicable in all fields of vocational edu- 
cation. In the endeavor to arrive at these general principles 
careful attention should be given to the methods followed 
throughout the ages in achieving vocational competency by 
means of vocational by-education, especially should organ- 
ized apprenticeship prove fertile in suggestion. 

4. Obviously, any discussion of methods in particular 
fields of vocational education is dependent upon clear-cut 
differentiation of aims to be achieved. These may be ex- 
pressed in terms of proximate aims, that is, in terms of pro- 
ductive competency for near and limited periods; or else 
they may be so stated also to include expected final stages 
to be reached and also with reference to the possibilities of 
advancement, promotion, passage from one calling to an- 
other that may all be involved. 

5. Again, the principles of motivation should be given 
consideration. At the present time, when attendance on a 
vocational school is not obligatory except in the case of that 
very limited number of young persons who may be com- 
mitted to reform schools or reformatories, it should be ac- 
cepted as a first principle that no vocational education can 
really be worth while except in the case of the individual who 
is already desirous of equipping himself for competency in 
the vocation selected. As far as practicable, vocational 



io8 Vocational Education 

guidance should be employed to confirm the youth in the 
wisdom of the choice that he has made. Again, any nor- 
mal provision which the vocational school itself can make 
for the stimulation of active learning motives on the part of 
the student, such as an easy sequence of stages of learning, 
special exercises for assisting him to pass difificult points, 
maximum opportunities for concrete participation, especially 
for students who find abstract learning difficult, sound eval- 
uation of results of learner's work at every stage and, 
finally, the giving to the learner of the commercial rewards 
for his work at the earliest possible stages, deserves fullest 
practicable development. All of these may be regarded as 
legitimate and desirable incentives. Perhaps appeal to com- 
petitive motives might also be made through the giving of 
rewards to the best or most rapid workers, the method of 
the bonus, etc., although these are forms of incentive that 
experience in other fields of education convinces us should 
be applied sparingly. 

6. Another principle of method has to do with the recog- 
nition at all stages of vocational education of the three 
fundamental divisions already indicated — namely, that of 
practical participation, that of mastery of related technical 
knowledge, and that of social insight. In general, it may 
be held that the proportion of time given by the vocational 
school as such (that is, apart from participation in produc- 
tive work for its own sake under commercial conditions) 
should be chiefly to practice work at the outset, with a grad- 
ually increasing emphasis upon technical knowledge as the 
student builds up a basis of practice for purposes of inter- 
pretation. As the student grows to greater maturity and 
experience increasing emphasis should be placed upon the 
third division of social insight. 

7. Experience seems to indicate that another important 
principle of method to be applied as far as practicable in the 
case of beginners is that of organizing nearly all teaching 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 109 

units, especially in so far as these are concerned with prac- 
tical work, on what is known as the project basis. The 
great advantage of the organization of teaching units on 
the project basis is to be found in the pupil's own clear com- 
prehension, from the outset, of the particular goal of 
achievement, proximate though it may be, to which he may 
address himself. A subsequent section of this chapter is 
devoted to analysis of the project method. (See also dis- 
cussions in chapters on Agricultural, Industrial and Home- 
making Education.) 

Factors in Vocational Competency. — The competency of 
the successful worker in almost any calling is a resultant of 
several factors or components, each of which is to a degree 
capable of independent analysis. Some of these are purely 
hereditary in character — such as the types of physical 
strength, quickness of reaction, powers of endurance and 
various temperamental feeling and intellectual qualities, as 
to which men differ greatly among themselves. Some of 
these qualities are due to the character of the nurture pro- 
vided in early life — the food, shelter, rest, play, and social 
stimuli which determine whether growth shall be good or 
bad, complete or incomplete. Doubtless, too, some of the 
factors making for the success of the worker receive their 
character from these portions of his school, and extra-school, 
education which had been obtained quite without specific 
reference to a possible vocation. 

But leaving all these aside for the time, we can profitably 
consider those sets of factors into which the productive 
power of any good individual worker may be analyzed which 
are primarily the results of his vocational experience, train- 
ing, and study — whether formal or informal, organized or 
unorganized, direct or indirect. 

The principles of method require recognition in almost 
all fields of vocational education of at least three fundamen- 
tal phases, namely: {a) the attainment of practical skill— ^ 



no Vocational Education 

manipulative or managerial — and other similar results of 
definite experience; {h) the acquisition of related technical 
knowledge; and (c) the development of related physical, 
social and cultural insights and appreciations. A fourth 
stage may be involved where definite training towards 
leadership or powers of directing others, presents itself as a 
special problem, but for the present we shall include this 
under managerial skill. 

The relation of abstract knowledge to skill in a sound 
scheme of pedagogy constitutes a peculiarly difficult prob- 
lem for vocational education. Probably with the majority 
of individuals, and having in view the usual run of occupa- 
tions, the best approach to the vocation, after having estab- 
lished certain preliminary ideals, and after having discovered 
an active motive for vocation mastery, should be along the 
lines of concrete achievement on carefully selected units of 
the work itself. As fast as this achievement gives a concrete 
basis for the acquisition of related technical knowledge that 
also should, in the form of some definite unit, be made a 
matter of attainment. Finally, with the growing conscious- 
ness of mastery and the interest in the social aspects of the 
manipulative or managerial — and other similar results of 
vocation, it is likely that extended appreciation of physical, 
social, and cultural aspects can be definitely developed as a 
series of related '' B class " studies. 

Correct method not only requires approach through 
achievement, but also in as many cases as practicable, the 
learner's own enjoyment of the results of that achievement 
as found best in convictions of workman's standards reached 
and secondarily in enjoyment of a certain monetary profit 
resulting from the work itself. Sound pedagogy suggests, 
therefore, that wherever practicable, the learner should reap 
the reward of his efforts in the form of a wage, piece pay- 
ment, or other valuable return. In rare instances, as in 
agriculture, the learner's own family may be the direct re- 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education iii 

cipients of the goods produced, but, even here, the funda- 
mental economic principle should be followed of insuring 
to the individual definite reward of his labor. 

We may readily analyze the mastery of his vocation shown 
by the farmer into '' skills " or manual and managerial per- 
formance and technical knowledge of the ends, means and 
methods which will make his work successful. The house- 
building carpenter must possess numerous forms of special 
skill, as shown in his use of hand tools conspicuously, and 
also must have the mastery of technical knowledge which 
enables him to make plans, read drawings, perform calcu- 
lations, estimate costs, etc. The worth of the stenographer 
to her employer is determined partly by her precision and 
speed in taking dictation and transcribing notes ; and in part 
by her ''knowledge" (as we say in ordinary speech) of 
spelling, punctuation, and the technical terminology peculiar 
to her employer's calling, including even facts of geography 
or history. Any one of us can, in a measure, disentangle in 
the skein representing the total competency of routine per- 
formance, the respective elements of skill and technical 
knowledge (or something closely corresponding to them), 
in surgeons, nurses, cooks, primary grade teachers, horse- 
shoers, plumbers, tailors, machinists, automobile repairers, 
ship captains, grocery-store clerks, locomotive engineers, 
coal mining operatives, telegraph messenger boys, and poul- 
try raisers. The distinctions here drawn, it must be ob- 
served — as e.g. between the stenographer's " skill " in short- 
hand and her " technical knowledge " of spelling — may not 
be fundamental or important distinctions psychologically, 
but they are of great importance in determining educational 
procedures, as will be shown later. 

Analysis of the hundreds of vocations followed by men 
and women seems to show that the relative amounts of tech- 
nical knowledge and skill essential to optimum performance 
vary greatly. The deck laborer, the coal passer, the min- 



112 



Vocational Education 



ing " mucker " and so-called unskilled physical workers gen- 
erally, find their services valued largely in proportion to their 
specialized, and often easily acquired skill in using their 
exceptional physical strength and endurance. Similarly, 
the cigarette maker, the chambermaid, the spinner, and 
fruit-picker and the numberless workers on specialized pro- 
cesses in factory operations seem to be paid chiefly for the 
skill that expresses itself in detailed forms of speed and 
accuracy. The amounts of what may properly be called 
technical knowledge required or desirable, in the case of 
these workers, seems very small indeed. On the other hand, 
one thinks of accountants, field salesmen, surveyors, elec- 
trical workers, teachers, army officers, pharmacists, report- 
ers, printers, actors and perhaps housewives and farmers, 
as possessing relatively great needs of technical knowledge 
as compared with what is sometimes half contemptuously 
called — especially by schoolmen — ''mere skill." 

II 

Skill in the " Arts." — To the reader informed as to the 
evolution of productive processes it will already have oc- 
curred that at least some of the distinctions here discussed 
depend upon the stage of advancement reached by the field 
of work itself. The industrial arts, as they have long been 
called, possessed a large '' content " to be acquired only by 
practical experience, long before the technical knowledge 
possible to them had been as it were detached or disen- 
tangled. Such operations as cooking, tanning, tempering of 
steel, making of cigars, extracting teeth, making garments, 
teaching children, gardening, and the like, were highly 
developed as " practical arts " long before the '' technical 
knowledge " interpreting the practice was understood. 
Men produced harmonies by aid of voice and instrument 
long before the scientific facts of musical harmony were un- 
derstood. Probably the " arts of healing " rendered some 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 113 

valuable service to mankind long before there was a science 
of medicine. The gardening of China is to-day one of the 
most productive forms of tillage in the world; but the Chi- 
nese have as yet no agricultural science. In these practical 
arts there is involved, of course, '' knowledge " and that, 
often, very involved and extensive. It is transmitted by the 
intimate processes of apprenticeship, as a part of the " tricks 
of the trade " and to the external observer at least it appears 
to be an integral part of the skill of the worker. In the 
fullest sense of the term as used here, technical stands rather 
for those elements that have been segregated out, put in 
print, or given graphic representation; but the distinction 
should not be pushed too far. 

The practical bearings of the present discussion appear 
when we study the evolution of schools of vocational educa- 
tion and the problems confronting us in America when we 
try to increase the variety, extend the range, and improve 
the effectiveness of vocational schools. A survey of this 
evolution discloses three fundamental facts: {a) the age- 
old and approved method of teaching practical skill in voca- 
tion is through actual participation in the work being done, 
such participation when organized and regulated being called 
apprenticeship; (h) when, in any vocation, a body of some- 
what detached or separately organized technical knowledge 
(including special forms of skill) has been created in or 
about a given vocation, the methods of apprenticeship or un- 
organized participation are ineffective in securing needed 
mastery of this technical knowledge; and (c) it is recogni- 
tion of this fact that gives rise to demands for special 
classes or schools which shall insure acquisition of this 
knowledge or necessary special skill. 

Vocational Schools to Supplement Apprenticeship. — To a 
large extent, therefore, the earlier schools that deserve to be 
called vocational (more correctly to be designated as techni- 
cal schools) were established for persons already in or com- 



114 Vocational Education 

pleting an apprenticeship. In America as early as 1840 
there had been founded in our larger cities " Mechanics' In- 
stitutes," the primary purposes of which seem to have been 
to provide facilities for the technical instruction of those 
who had completed their apprenticeship. These Institutes, 
often endowed by philanthropists, were planned to contain 
libraries of technical books and drawings and even exhibits 
of new machines and products. Under them were organ- 
ized evening classes in drawing, science, mathematics, etc., 
for advanced apprentices or journeymen. 

It is well known that the system of continuation schools 
found in Germany had its origin largely in the attempts, 
sometimes of organized masters or employers, sometimes of 
journeymen or workers, to provide needed education, gen- 
eral or vocational, beyond that practicable under the condi- 
tions of apprenticeship. As far as possible these schools 
were at first conducted outside of the working hours claimed 
by the person or employment to which the youth was ap- 
prenticed — on Sundays, in the evenings, during slack sea- 
sons, etc. But none of these expedients sufficed to insure 
needed definiteness or continuity of training; hence the legis- 
lation, first usually enacted in the smaller states, prescribing 
a minimum number of hours per week for a stated number 
of weeks per year during which the worker must attend a 
duly approved continuation school. 

The earlier colleges of medicine and law seem to have been 
largely devised for apprentices. Their courses consisted 
chiefly of lectures given by the best known practitioners or 
specialists of the community. The "teacher-training" col- 
leges of England were for years open only to those who 
had served an apprenticeship as " pupil-teachers." Per- 
haps the most successful work done by the agricultural col- 
leges of America (when judged by the combined standards 
of economy of cost and effectiveness of result) has been the 
*' short course " instruction offered in the college itself, and 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 115 

the " extension " instruction carried to the farms. The ef- 
fectiveness of its instruction is due largely to the fact that 
a large amount of practical experience has already been ac- 
quired by the learner (he had served an apprenticeship in 
the University of Hard Knocks, he would say). The cor- 
respondence school which now so greatly exploits the cre- 
dulity of the poorly informed achieves successful results in 
some cases when its courses are taken by persons already 
having successful experience of a practical character. 

In fact, the conception that those elements of vocational 
competency that we call skill of performance (including 
many more or less intangible elements which we ascribe to 
" experience " only) could be taught by, or under the direc- 
tion of, a vocational school is very modern. A " school " 
could teach facts as these were capable of definite formula- 
tion in printed matter, written problem, or graphic repre- 
sentation. It could teach the " principles "of the vocation 
(a form of pedagogic camouflage very dear to the school- 
master type of mind, and in the case of some few students, 
quite successful). Even yet the large majority of engi- 
neering schools, business schools, agricultural colleges and 
schools, departments for the " preparation " of secondary 
school teachers, home economics classes, and industrial 
*' technical schools " (technical high schools, schools of me- 
chanic arts, etc.) make it their primary aim to teach the 
'' principles " and other more or less abstract facts or forms 
of special skill that lend themselves to the teaching powers of 
men working chiefly with and through books, blackboards, 
drawing paper and the like, the abstract methods of approach 
being rendered somewhat more concrete during recent years 
by adjuncts of laboratory, studio, experimental " flats," im- 
itations of " office practice," and gardening " plots." 

Pre-apprenticeship. — Where vocational education for 
organized trades giving apprenticeship does not appear to be 
feasible the suggestion naturally arises as to why a so-called 



ii6 Vocational Education 

vocational school should not undertake certain pre-appren- 
ticeship training which will almost inevitably be along tech- 
nical rather than practical lines. The writer is unable to see 
why, where apprenticeship is well organized, any school vo- 
cational education should be required under the head of pre- 
apprenticeship. It would be very much better that the 
learner should formally enter upon his apprenticeship, after 
which the vocational school should supplement by giving 
opportunities for extension teaching. 

There is very much needed at the present time, an analysis 
of all of those industrial pursuits for which apprenticeship is 
still a possibility. It will be found, probably, that not only 
is apprenticeship declining in the main, but that the very 
conditions which even yet make apprenticeship learning a 
possibility in some cases are themselves changing. 

It now appears probable that intensive short course work 
will serve the needs of a vastly greater number of workers in 
industry and commerce than can ever profit from systematic 
apprenticeship teaching, at least if modern industry contin- 
ues to evolve in accordance with current tendencies. 

A somewhat illusory objective often urged in connection 
with so-called pre-apprenticeship training is that of holding 
the pupils longer in school. Elsewhere, the writer has indi- 
cated his conviction that this is not a worthy objective in 
and of itself, and that pupils should be urged to stay in 
school beyond the compulsory period only in case it is evi- 
dent that the school has something of substantial profit to 
offer them. It will be found in many cases, that the period 
of prolonged attendance, especially on the part of pupils 
somewhat retarded, becomes a period of semi-idleness in 
which habits of inattention and half-hearted work are not 
even offset by vigorous play or other spontaneous activity. 

But it is highly desirable that throughout the junior high 
school period offerings of vigorous practical arts work, not 
designed necessarily to utilize a vocational motive or to pro- 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 117 

duce anything more than a very moderate degree of voca- 
tional guidance should be available. 

Basic Vocational Education. — Our conceptions of the 
pedagogy of vocational education recently have widened 
sufficiently to admit the possibility of giving under some 
form of school conditions, or at least control, the " training " 
that, supplementing technical instruction, gives finally the 
completely equipped worker. Numerous examples will 
occur to the well-informed reader. The best medical col- 
leges provide the facilities, and encourage the " technically " 
equipped graduate to take one or more years of practice in 
clinic and other hospital service. Cincinnati University, in 
several lines of professional vocational education, develops a 
" part time " plan whereby the learner, early in the course, 
shall, under the guidance of his school, participate in " ac- 
tual " work, perhaps productive work for wages. The more 
progressive engineering colleges require that their students 
shall give up one or more vacations to practical work. 
Schools for the training of teachers for kindergarten and 
primary schools require the equivalent of three to six 
months' " practice training." Schools training stenogra- 
phers lay increasing stress on results in the shape of the speed 
and accuracy actually demanded in business practice. With 
very few exceptions the foremost exponents of vocational 
education for any given calling are seeking to improve the 
means whereby the practical training or its equivalent re- 
quired to produce positive skill can be provided. It can cor- 
rectly be said that the essentials of the twentieth century 
movement in America for the extension and improvement of 
vocational education are found in the demands and expecta- 
tions that this training shall be '' practical " — that is, shall 
give in largest practicable measure the skills and other re- 
sults which have heretofore been available only from actual 
participation, systematized or unsystematized, in wage-earn- 
ing or other productive work. 



ii8 Vocational Education 

The sources of these demands and expectations have been, 
clearly, twofold, (a) Participation in the economic sense 
in productive work, and with only secondary reference to 
educational outcome, has been falling manifestly, even when 
highly organized under conditions of apprenticeship, to keep 
pace with the requirements of the age. One does not now 
expect the prospective physician, lawyer, architect or, even in 
England, the elementary school teacher, to serve an appren- 
ticeship prior to professional study. No business man now 
expects to undertake the initial training of the stenographer 
or accountant, and he is increasingly reluctant to do it in 
the case of the file clerk, sales woman, and specialized book- 
keeper. In proportion as farming, stockraising, home- 
making, traveling salesmanship, secondary school teaching, 
and numberless other callings develop beyond the stage of 
being simple " arts " to be learned by simply beginning to 
work with or under the somewhat distant direction of other 
workers — in that proportion does the need of specialized 
schools which can teach " practice as well as theory " become 
apparent. In the case of the industrial callings, in many 
of which a well organized apprenticeship once existed, it has 
become commonplace knowledge that the evolution of fac- 
tory production has been accompanied by a steady impair- 
ment of all the essential features of apprenticeship. 

(b) The second substantial reason for modern interest 
in more comprehensive vocational education is found in the 
broadening conceptions of possible pedagogical means and 
methods. The older type of educator associated all impor- 
tant education with reading and writing. The educational 
reformers even of centuries ago inveighed in vain against 
purely abstract teaching but their striving to teach in part by 
the use of "objects" met little support. The laboratory as an 
adjunct in teaching science developed in the face of much 
opposition long after " science subjects " had been grudg- 
ingly admitted into curriculums of general education (when 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education iig 

nicely compacted into well-bound texts). Progressive pri- 
mary teachers heard with approval decades ago the in- 
junction '' have children learn to do by doing," but the seed 
long fell on stony ground in spite of the lip approval often 
given. Hence it was necessarily long before the idea could 
be accepted that entire realms of possible '' school " educa- 
tion might lie wholly outside of and beyond the immediate 
regions of lectures, books, pens and paper, drawing on black- 
board and cardboard, and even laboratory instruction 
itself. 

Of course, we are far from being free from the traditions 
here yet. The school as we have had it for five hundred 
years or more has derived its pedagogical procedures chiefly 
from the methods essential to the teaching of the reading and 
writing of language. Hence the chief and often the only tools 
which schools knew how to use were printed materials and 
means of writing. Many curious results persist to this day. 
We have hardly any substantial pedagogy for the teaching 
of a foreign language that does not start with the printed 
page and writing materials. The kindergarten effected a 
great break with tradition, the good effects of which are felt 
in the primary schools of to-day. The use of the laboratory 
as an adjunct in teaching science was also an important de- 
parture, but one soon corrupted by formalisms nearly re- 
lated to tho^e it was designed to escape. There are still 
many among us who contend that *' mere trade training " is 
not " education " — one wonders what are their actual con- 
ceptions of '' education." 

Ill 

Types of Vocational Schools. — The essential pedagogical 
problems now confronting all attempts at the development of 
vocational education in schools involve chiefly the relations 
of the procedures which give, on the one hand, skill or the 
other results of practice, and on the other, technical knowl- 



I20 Vocational Education 

edge or special forms of skill in ancillary processes. These 
relationships may be classified into certain types : — 

A. The most primitive form, in which both skill and so 
much of technical knowledge as can be picked up therewith 
are given under conditions of actual participation in work, 
unorganized and often unsupervised, as in the home or on 
the farm, or else organized as apprenticeship. The great 
bulk of vocational education still found in the world is of 
this order. 

B. Next in order of historical development is the supple- 
menting of apprenticeship or other learning through par- 
ticipation by special schools or classes to give technical 
knowledge including tributary special skills. Examples as 
noted above include : the earlier schools of medicine, law, 
pharmacy, dentistry, and in England, teacher training; the 
extension and short courses for farmers offered by the agri- 
cultural colleges ; the evening classes in mechanics, drawing, 
etc., offered to apprentices or journeymen under the old Me- 
chanics' Institutes, all " evening industrial " school classes 
organized under the first industrial school legislation (1907- 
1916) in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Indiana and other 
states giving state aid to vocational education; a great va- 
riety of extension courses given through correspondence or 
otherwise by private and public agencies. 

C. Schools giving technical knowledge of vocations, 
supplemented by some laboratory practice, but leaving the 
student to acquire skill and the other results of experience 
after leaving the school, have flourished in recent years. 
Of this type are: the medical, law, engineering, and other 
professional colleges intermediate between the primitive 
type discussed under B and the very modern type noted in 
D below; normal schools, usually, before the development 
of practice; almost all college departments for the so-called 
training of secondary school teachers; technical high, or 
mechanic arts high schools for such of their students as 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 121 

subsequently enter occupations related to those whose tech- 
nical aspects have been studied in college; almost all com- 
mercial or business ''colleges," schools or departments of 
schools; nearly all agricultural colleges and schools; nearly 
all existing courses in, or schools of, home economics; and 
many of the earlier publicly supported industrial, including 
some alleged trade, schools in which the so-called practical 
work consisted merely of exercises or half play-like at- 
tempts at practical work. 

D. The fourth type emerges when the vocational school 
undertakes to present not merely technical knowledge, but 
enough of " real practices " to enable the learner to substi- 
tute the results of this practice for apprenticeship or other 
educative participation, either before or after taking his 
technical studies. The modern medical college provides 
extensive opportunities for clinical practice for its students 
ere they leave the institution. The modern normal school 
requires some months of '' practice teaching." The real 
trade school not only seeks to do " practical " work, but en- 
deavors to have it done on commercial orders, — " to meet 
the requirements of the market." The best agricultural 
schools are to-day teaching the boys " farming," through 
making them small farmers by means of the " home proj- 
ect " method carried out on a commercial scale. Engineer- 
ing colleges are striving to introduce a measure of practical 
experience into their offerings by requiring students to de- 
vote one or more vacations to the acquisition of practical 
experience " in the field " before completing their work. A 
few schools for the initial teaching of salesmanship (not ex- 
tension courses for persons already employed) require that 
the learner shall " work by selling " every Monday and Sat- 
urday, and throughout the entire month of December (peri- 
ods when opportunities in mercantile establishments can eas- 
ily be procured). Almost all forms of vocational education 
in very recent years have strenuously endeavored to increase 



122 Vocational Education 

their facilities for " practical work " notwithstanding the 
very persistent opposition of the strongly entrenched teach- 
ers of the technical subjects. The force back of the demand 
for more practical work has been, of course, public opinion 
and expressed requirements of employing authorities who 
are always competing for that service which is most nearly 
ready to meet their needs. 

E. A fifth variety of school designed to procure basic 
vocational training (technical knowledge plus practical ex- 
perience) appears when the school, instead of attempting to 
maintain hospitals, shops, farms, homes, offices, or sales- 
rooms of its own, uses for its educational purposes commer- 
cial or other '' going " agencies already in existence. In 
fact, the " home projects " in farming, and the use of de- 
partment stores in teaching girls salesmanship included 
under D above are somewhat of this order. The best 
known examples are the " part-time " experiments in Fitch- 
burg, Cincinnati, Beverly, and other places. Where contin- 
uation school attendance is obligatory some devices have 
been evolved which belong properly under this class. A few 
colleges send their advanced or graduate students to serve as 
apprentice teachers under the direction of the training insti- 
tution, in the surrounding schools. 

For each of the foregoing types of vocational schools, 
doubtless, fundamental methods of organizing and conduct- 
ing instruction and training of particular kinds will have to 
be evolved. But, as has been noted before, back of all prob- 
lems of vocational education lie certain fundamental prob- 
lems growing out of the economic changes which, long per- 
sistent, increase now at a geometrical rate of speed. Few 
writers on education have as yet given adequate attention to 
modern conditions which tend to increase regimentation of 
production. 

Types of Vocational Education. — The simplest types of 
teaching in vocational education, are, of course, to be found 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 123 

when the elder worker, or more skilled worker, shows the 
younger or less skilled. At bottom there exists in all per- 
sons in some degree genuine instincts of teaching, — other- 
wise to be described as instincts of showing, leading, helping, 
suggesting, instigating, directing, controlling, governing, or- 
ganizing, commanding, etc. On the other hand, under the 
right social stimulus, there doubtless also appear always the 
'' learning " instincts — instincts of following, imitating, 
yielding, inquiring, submitting to authority, desire to be 
shown, etc. The operation of these social instincts can be 
seen on any playground, in any school, shop, or other theater 
of social activity. 

The most complicated types of vocational teaching are to 
be found in large schools of vocational training where teach- 
ing functions are highly subdivided, — where, for example, 
one teacher, who, perhaps, has never practiced the vocation 
itself, imparts certain technical knowledge, another directs 
certain experimental work, and still a third supervises ini- 
tial efforts at practice. Subdivision of vocational teaching 
of this character can now be seen in normal schools, agricul- 
tural colleges, medical colleges, schools of navigation, and 
the like. In not a few commercial departments of high 
schools, one teacher takes charge of stenography, another of 
typewriting, a third of commercial law, a fourth of English. 
A few of the larger trade schools exhibit similar tendencies. 

An intermediate stage is found where one teacher or type 
of teacher is responsible for '' practice " and another for so- 
called *' theory " or the " related technical subjects." In a 
few cases of half developed vocational schools, a teacher of 
" manual exercises " has been found, who is not himself a 
master of the trade being taught, but who could teach on a 
manual training basis, some of the manual training activities 
involved in it. 

There are good grounds for believing that an ideal voca- 
tional education, at least for the non-professional occupa- 



124 Vocational Education 

tions, can best be given by one person who is at once master 
of its practical phases and at the same time intimately ac- 
quainted with its technical aspects and who, with these pow- 
ers combines a large vision as to the possibilities of the right 
exercise of the calling, to affect for the better, society and 
the personality of the worker. If we could find a worker 
with this equipment who is also a gifted teacher, beginners, 
at any rate, would, under his direction, probably grow faster 
in vocational competency than in any other way. Some suc- 
cessful experiments in agricultural education have been ex- 
ecuted on this basis (based upon the '' home project," the 
pupils putting in something over half their time on these 
home projects, visited by the teacher). 

But there is little indication that this method of vocational 
education will prove successful except in those two classes 
of callings which in many respects are still in elemental or 
primitive stages of evolution, — namely, farming and home- 
making. The same method should be capable of application 
in many monotechnic industrial occupations (specialized 
machine processes or subdivisions of trades), but teachers 
equal to the responsibilities of this position are hardly yet 
available. 

It is highly probable that in most forms of vocational edu- 
cation, teaching processes will be specialized and even that 
others than teachers will be required for special phases — 
business agents to take charge of the administration of work, 
coordinators to arrange for and supervise, on behalf of the 
school, pupils assigned to part time productive work in shops, 
etc. Probably developments in this direction can best be 
considered by taking the different classes of vocations suc- 
cessively. 

Vocational Education for Specialized Pursuits. — It has 
everywhere and always been the tendency for men advancing 
in economic power to specialize their vocational pursuits. 
This tendency is furthered by all exploration, invention, use 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 125 

of capital, improvements in transportation, demands for su- 
perior service, and the employment of regimental organiza- 
tion in production. 

We find early developments of territorial specialization of 
production. Furs came from one quarter of the world, 
spices from another, silks from a third. Complicated sys- 
tems of exchange of commodities early appeared in the ef- 
forts of men to obtain from the regions producing them re- 
spectively precious metals, tin, copper, iron, wines, and dye- 
stuffs. Later, the production of woolen goods, whale oil, 
dried fish, leather goods, jewelry, and other art products 
in localized communities laid the foundations for special- 
ized production and commerce of the middle and later cen- 
turies. 

The application of steam power to manufacture and trans- 
portation has enormously increased the processes of territo- 
rial and personal specialization of production. Certain areas 
and populations of the world are now engaged chiefly in 
manufacture; others in trade and commerce; others in fish- 
eries; others in production of temperate zone food prod- 
ucts ; and still others, in growing tropical products for food 
or manufacture. 

The invention of machinery has been one large contrib- 
uting factor to this process of specialization. Improve- 
ments of rail and water transportation have been essential 
to the development of any considerable territorial speciali- 
zation of production. Power using tools have made neces- 
sary large use of capital in production, thus causing each type 
of industrial production to enlarge its units and, frequently, 
to aggregate these in specialized communities — e.g. cotton 
products in Manchester, edge tools in Sheffield, firearms in 
Connecticut, pottery in the Ohio Valley, meat packing in 
Chicago and St. Louis, etc. 

Agriculture tends always towards specialization. Fron- 
tiersmen live by hunting and trapping ; their immediate sue- 



126 Vocational Education 

cessors support themselves by lumbering in some regions and 
by stockraising in others. Tillage, often miscellaneous at 
first, gradually settles down along the lines of production 
most adapted to the locality — cotton in the Southern states, 
wheat in the northwest, fruit in California, cotton in the 
Southern states, coffee in Brazil, bananas in Costa Rica, wine 
in Italy and France. Experience and scientific inquiry re- 
veal the desirability of "complementary" farming — corn 
and hogs, beets and cattle — in individual units, for maxi- 
mum use of either land or labor, and also of rotation of crops 
for soil conservation. Concerted social action may prevent 
overspecialization on one type production — e.g. cotton in 
Southern states — and so tend to promote an *' optimum" 
diversification. But however far this may go, it is clear 
that the future wdll see steady increase in specialized pro- 
ducers from the soil. 

In commerce and manufacture there seem to be no limits 
to specialization of individual workers as regimentation de- 
velops and mechanism is perfected. The application of 
power has tended to make of the worker a '* machine 
tender " as one can say disparagingly, or a " machine user " 
or controller if one thinks of the increased control of pro- 
duction resulting. The driver of a locomotive, the pilot or 
captain of a ship, the typewriter, the loom operator, the 
hoisting mine engineer, the gunner firing a modern cannon, 
the wireless operator, the street car motorman, the farmer 
driving a harvester, the drill press operative and the book 
pressman all have this in common — each controls many 
and involved processes through complicated and costly 
machinery and in every case the enlargement of working 
units and the perfection of devices tends to simplify his 
work and to enable him to give his fullest attention to the 
immediate service he is employed to render. 

The degree of native and of acquired intelligence called 
for in each case as well as capacity to take responsibility 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 127 

necessarily varies. We think of any man or woman — but 
not a child — as being capable of caring for, and using, a 
watch, a cookstove, or a sewing machine. We look with 
more solicitude after the qualifications of one offering to 
drive an automobile, a team and mowing machine, a steam 
drill, a planer, a street car, an office-building elevator, or a 
loom. Only to exceptional men do we entrust the naviga- 
tion of a ship, the drawing of an express passenger train, 
the boring of large cannon, the operation of a newspaper 
printing press, or the rolling of heavy plates. But wherever 
we can simplify the work of the machine director, make his 
tools '' fool proof," diminish the element of the " personal 
equation," we do so — and our action in that direction ac- 
cords with the best efforts of civilized society to transfer, 
first to beasts of burden, and then to inanimate forces, the 
drudgery of production. It may be that sometimes we keep 
the young worker too long with one tool, that a certain 
amount of shifting would give a better '' physical and intel- 
lectual development from work," and that our means of find- 
ing the maximum use for the abilities of any one individual 
are not yet at all what they should be. But these constitute 
problems of adjustment, not to be solved by the restoration 
of the conditions of hard production formerly prevailing. 

It would not be wholly illogical to assume the existence of 
a fundamental social tendency towards such harnessing of 
natural forces that eventually man would be called upon to 
perform no drudgery. This has long been the dream of 
toil worn humanity when it should arrive at the land flowing 
with milk and honey, the New Jerusalem beyond the grave 
where none need work, and where each artistic soul " in his 
separate star shall paint the thing as he sees it, for the God 
of things as they are." 

But for the present we cannot escape the conviction that 
man's increasing wants tend at least to keep pace with his 
increasing productivity, and that therefore the development 



128 Vocational Education 

of greater earning power (in terms of want-supplying com- 
modities) does not lead to diminution of effort. This is 
especially seen among prosperous farmers, middle class pro- 
fessional men, and operators with moderate amounts of cap- 
ital everywhere. The effects of specialized production upon 
the probable needs for, and character of, vocational educa- 
tion are referred to elsewhere. What the effects will be on 
methods of training and instruction it is too early to predict. 
In many cases it will greatly increase the needs and require- 
ments of managerial education. For others it creates acute 
needs for specialized training in skill, and especially for 
situations involving combinations of speed and skill. We 
are now within sight of practicable experimental investiga- 
tions here. 

The "Project" as a Teaching Unit For purposes of 

school-room administration, the subject matter used to real- 
ize any particular purpose in education must be broken up 
into subdivisions so as to form serviceable " teaching units." 
Broadly speaking, a subject itself is such a unit — e.g. his- 
tory, American history, geography, French. An amount of 
one of these subjects suitable or convenient for a year's 
work (or other long period) gives us the "course" — an- 
other type of unit. We speak of a course in First-year 
French, Advanced Mathematics, etc. Also, for purposes 
of convenience, we divide courses into subdivisions of vari- 
ous sorts — e.g. the book, part, chapter (at least in the text- 
book), section, topic, lesson, etc. For pedagogical rather 
than administrative reasons, these divisions are also often 
broken up into sections, such as definitions, exercises, expla- 
nations, assigned readings, references, rules, questions, vo- 
cabularies, conspectuses, tables, etc. 

Now the primary purpose of making all these divisions 
and subdivisions is, of course, some form of efficiency — 
efficiency of organization, of accessibility, of mastery. Usu- 
ally, as in all other forms of activity, we prefer to have the 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 129 

dividing lines or boundaries in educational subject-matter 
fall where nature itself or the work of man has created chan- 
nels, cleavages, or natural classifications. But if this cannot 
be done, we create purely arbitrary divisions. To use com- 
parable situations in other fields, we find that a grain of 
wheat, a natural subdivision of " wheat," is too small for 
practicable handling, but a " field " of wheat too large. 
Hence we arbitrarily subdivide into bushels, centals, or 
" sacks " where " manhandling " is necessary. But in ren- 
dering a beef portable we first naturally '' quarter " it, and 
these we again divide, partly along natural lines. For ease 
of ascent we break a steep slope up into '' steps " and we also 
often create larger divisions by landings. 

vSometimes we find we have pushed the subdividing pro- 
cess too far or in wrong directions. We are trying to blend 
elementary algebra and geometry, botany and zoology, etc. 
Or we subdivide what before was merged — e.g. physical 
geography and commercial geography, English language and 
English literature, etc. We have given up the old catecheti- 
cal unit — the question and the answer; and in such subjects 
as geography and history, the lesson (which was usually 
based on one day's working energy of the child in a stated 
subject, and hence could rarely be a " natural " unit) has 
largely disappeared. It can still be retained in reading and 
" language lessons " because these consist largely of exer- 
cises which can be cut ofT at any point suggested by the lim- 
itations of energy on the part of the learner. 

The importance of having good teaching units in educa- 
tion is no less than is the importance of having good working 
subdivisions of time, matter, force, distance, difificulty, etc., 
in practical activities elsewhere. 

In packing goods we devise packages adapted to, or con- 
trolled by, the conditions to be met. A box or small crate 
of cantaloupes may be very light for a man to carry, but a 
larger box would result in damage to the melons. But 



130 Vocational Education 

these small boxes can be crated for handling by trucks. 
Wheat is sacked in bags adapted to a strong man who must 
" use no hooks " ; while fabrics can be boxed in packages that 
no man can lift because truck handling with hooks is prac- 
ticable. The size of a newspaper, the weight of a volume, 
the length of a sermon, the duration of a call, the size of a 
" portion " of food, the height of a table, the width of a 
farm, the length of a day's work, the height of a room — all 
these units or divisions are the resultants of certain natural 
conditions working in greater or less opposition to man's 
forces and necessities. They all represent compromises, 
gravitating towards optimum standards. 

Varieties of Teaching Units. — But in the organization 
of the " means " of education — the studies, lectures, *' tell- 
ings," discussions, experiments, exercises, assigned read- 
ings, memorizings, reports, activities, problems, trials, tests, 
examinations, etc., through which we achieve our desired 
ends — we have given, as yet, insufficient attention to the or- 
ganization of effective teaching units of the smaller kind — 
those that would be especially significant to the learner. 
The " question and answer " unit — as seen at its best in 
the catechism — was the smallest unit ever devised. It was 
in part definitely pedagogical and in part definitely logical. 
It was eminently suited to an age in which authority was the 
source of all knowledge for the learner, and verbal memor- 
ization the chief means of fixing in the minds of each new 
generation the dogmas and other authoritative teachings of 
the older generation. This unit had also the peculiar ad- 
vantage of being most easily handled by unskilled and unin- 
formed teachers. 

The " lesson " unit was in part a pedagogical unit — that 
is, based upon the powers and weaknesses of learners — 
rather than a logical unit — that is, based upon the inherent 
characteristics of subject matter. It was, of course, not a 
true pedagogical unit — that is, taking account of all of the 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 131 

characteristics to be found in the child as active learner; it 
might be called a unit based roughly upon the capacity of the 
learner to give attention, to endure application, or to give 
working time. It was, in other words, a convenient task, a 
sort of day's work, so far as a particular kind of activity 
was concerned. It was often an arbitrarily sliced-off por- 
tion of subject matter, and represented frequently no logical 
division of that subject matter at all — resembling, there- 
fore, as a unit, a stated length of board or cloth, or a slice of 
bread rather than tree trunk, a garment or a biscuit. 

The " topic " which in many studies succeeded the lesson 
as the teaching unit of chief importance was especially 
characterized by its logical relation to somejarger unit or 
'' whole " of subject matter, while at the same time it was 
endeavored in it to take account of the possible focusing of 
interests and the intellectual *' spanning powers " of young 
learners. In many respects it was therefore an advance 
upon units previously developed. It lent itself especially 
well to teaching in which some reasoning, inference, and 
comparison on the part of the learner was sought in lieu 
of the verbal memorizing which had formerly prevailed. 

A few years ago some of us began using the word '' proj- 
ect " to describe a unit of educative work in which the most 
prominent feature was some form of positive and concrete 
achievement. The baking of a loaf of bread, the making 
of a shirtwaist, the raising of a bushel of corn, the making of 
a table, the installation of an electric bell outfit — all these, 
when so undertaken by learners and handled by teachers as 
to result in a large acquisition of knowledge and experience, 
were called projects. Projects of this kind might be indi- 
vidual or joint (cooperative). They might be executed in 
an ordinary lesson period or they might claim the efforts of 
the learner for one or more hours per day for several weeks. 

The following were the primary characteristics of proj- 
ects as thus conceived: (a) the undertaking always pos- 



132 Vocational Education 

sessed a certain unity; (b) the learner himself clearly con- 
ceived the practical end or outcome to be attained, and it 
was always expected that this outcome was full of interest 
to him, luring him on, as to a definite goal to be won; (c) 
the standards of achievement were clearly objective — so 
much so that the learner and his fellows could, in large part, 
render valuable decisions as to the work — in an amateur 
or in a commercial sense — of the product; and (d) the un- 
dertaking was of such a nature that the learner, in achieving 
his desired ends, would necessarily have to apply much of 
his previous knowledge and experience — perhaps hereto- 
fore not consciously held as usable in this way (e.g. art, 
science, mathematics, special tool skill) — and probably 
would have to acquire also some new knowledges and 
skills. 

As in many other forms of learning, the objectives held 
in view by learner and teacher were often unlike. What the 
learner imagined as an end the teacher conceived often as a 
means to some remoter end. 

The Project in Vocational Education In the early 

stages of the development of certain forms of agricultural 
and industrial vocational education, a number of educators 
favored the project as the chief pedagogic unit of organiza- 
tion. In a sense any concrete job undertaken in a voca- 
tional school where the realization of valuable results in 
product constitutes an important end, might be called a 
" project " ; but to be an '' educational project " such a job, 
e.g. turning a spindle, wiring a room, growing a half acre 
of potatoes, taking commercial charge of three cows for a 
year, cooking family breakfasts for a month, making ten 
saleable shirtwaists, cooperatively building and selling a 
cottage, etc., must be of such a nature as to offer large oppor- 
tunity, not only for the acquisition of new skill and expe- 
rience in practical manipulation, but also for application of 
old, and learning of new, *' related knowledge" — art, sci- 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 133 

ence, mathematics, administration, hygiene, social science, 
etc. 

The alternatives to the project as a teaching unit in voca- 
tional education are several, nearly all of which are exem- 
plified in any commercial school. They include: {a) the 
'^ practical exercise," the processes of which resemble in many 
respects the actual processes of the practical world, e.g. 
typewriting, stenographic drill, bookkeeping exercises, but 
which give no marketable or otherwise usable product; {h) 
technical subjects, organized topically, but commonly not 
definitely related to practical exercises then being considered, 
e.g. commercial arithmetic, business English; (c) joint 
enterprises of practical but nonproductive character, e.g^ 
commercial school banks, or offices; and {d) jobs on a 
'' gang " basis, largely for the commercially profitable ends 
of the institutions (not found in commercial schools, but of- 
ten characteristic of the '' practical " agricultural school with 
a large farm, and of institutions, as seen in chair caning, 
tailoring, gardening, dish-washing, etc. ) . 

In industrial schools the alternatives to the project chiefly 
found are : (a) the practical job contributing towards build- 
ing equipment or resulting in gifts to the learner; {h) the 
exercise; and (c) the series of technical lessons. But these 
are seldom related, whereas in the *' project " it is expected 
to integrate them all. 

About the same time that the word '' project " came into 
popular use in discussions of vocational education, it was 
also becoming popular in writing on manual training. The 
systems of sloyd had taught '* processes " largely, using 
" exercises " for this purpose. In each case any given item 
of practical work was conceived of as belonging to a very 
definite and logical series cumulative towards some general 
form of organized knowledge or skill. The " model " was, 
apparently, more '' integral " than the exercise as a stage in 
a " process," but it did not meet all the pedagogic needs 
later expressed in the practical arts " project." 



134 Vocational Education 

In practical arts (as distinguished from vocational edu- 
cation) the project was expected to give an integrated out- 
come and one which appealed to the child's sense of the 
*' worth-while." Hence the logical sequence of a series of 
projects might be hard to find, whereas, presumably, their 
pedagogic appeal to interests was manifest. By 1912 the 
project as a pedagogic unit of organization in practical arts 
and in vocational education had found a place, if not always 
a welcome. 

Then arose interest in the more effective teaching of 
science. In science teaching the " experiment " (which was 
in reality more often simply a directed exercise) corre- 
sponded to the " model " and " exercise " in the practical side 
of manual training. Logical considerations inherent in the 
subject matter of science gave rise to the so-called " logical 
order " (another name for the organization which seems 
most economical and effective to the specially informed and 
mature adult) which had always dominated in the selection 
and serial disposition of exercises and abstract studies of 
school science. Pedagogical organization (another term for 
the selection of matter and arrangement of steps making 
the subject most accessible to uninformed and youthful 
learners, with their childish motives, powers and frailties) 
had been largely ignored. But when a new start was at- 
tempted under the flag of " general science " it was found 
that a few units of the proposed rearrangements of the ma- 
terials of science could be described properly as projects. 

For example, if a group of pupils set out to make some 
photographs with school or borrowed equipment (clearly a 
project) it is possible to seize the interest and opportunity 
thus created to give a considerable amount of new knowledge 
(facts, interpretations), regarding the formation of the 
image, the use of the lens in adding to the light making the 
image, the chemistry of light action on certain compounds, 
the chemical significance of developing, etc. Similarly if 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 135 

a group of pupils set out to grow some plants under con- 
trolled conditions in the schoolroom, it is readily to be seen 
that this project gives varied opportunities to extend their 
comprehension of scientific facts and principles. Other proj- 
ects of a similarly useful and informing nature are now 
seen to be practicable : to exterminate flies in the school- 
house; to purify the water supply; to correct smoky lamps; 
to improve the time-keeping quality of a pendulum clock; 
to arrange soil conditions for tree planting of the grounds ; 
to improve a school-bell system; to cleanse spotted cloth- 
ing; to ascertain the wholesomeness of the home milk sup- 
ply; to prevent breeding of mosquitoes; to set up a home 
call-bell system ; to keep the teeth clean ; to improve the home 
processes of making biscuits; and a thousand others of simi- 
lar nature. 

We find, however, that the term " project " is hardly 
elastic enough to cover all the types of units of instruction 
which might well be organized under the head of general sci- 
ence. We might want our pupils to obtain some informa- 
tion as to comets; can we devise what can legitimately be 
called a project for this purpose? Of course we can call an 
enterprise destined to give the pupils more knowledge of 
comets (using books, pictures, and, perhaps, if circum- 
stances favor, some naked-eye observations and a peek 
through a telescope) a project in learning; but this simply 
stretches our useful term to unmanageable and unservice- 
able dimensions. We do not forget that Webster defines 
project as : *' that which is projected or designed; something 
intended or devised; a scheme, design or plan." 

Nevertheless it is to be hoped that we could give to the 
educational project a limited and definite meaning which 
would make it the designation of a useful type of teaching 
(or learning) unit, distinct from the lesson, the exercise, the 
topic, the experiment, the reading assignment, the inquiry, 
the investigation, etc. 



136 Vocational Education 

Perhaps it would be well to introduce modifiers to desig- 
nate different grades or classes of projects. Recently, when 
cooperating with a committee preparing a manual on house- 
hold arts, wherein it was desired to set forth as much of the 
work as possible on a project basis, it early became clear 
that in the divisions relating to the preparation and serving 
of food, and the making and repair of clothing, it was easy 
to find many projects suited to the ages and conditions of the 
pupils (girls 12-16) planned for. But in the divisions re- 
lating to the care of children (nursing) and the choice and 
equipment of the home (housing) it was difficult, if not im- 
possible, to find suitable projects as these are ordinarily 
conceived. To meet the dif^culty a new type of project 
was planned, called an " Observation and Report Project," 
to apply in nursing and housing. For example, a girl would 
undertake to survey a given house and study its location, 
yard, drainage, water supply, exposure to light, cold, etc., 
and make a report, with drawings, etc., thereon. Similar 
possible projects as to nursing were described. 

All these projects were divided into the following 
classes: Execution projects (school); execution projects 
(home and school) ; and observation and report projects. 
In addition, other learning units involving chiefly book study, 
were described — e.g. " telling " by teacher, exercises and 
school experimentation (calling them all topics), and of 
these topics, several kinds were distinguished. 

The Project as Correlation Center. — It is well known to 
all vocational school teachers that endless difficulties are en- 
countered in trying to '' correlate " technical courses of in- 
struction and practical work. The practical work necessa- 
rily requires its special organization, owing to gradation in 
difficulty of stages, etc. But the '' related " courses — 
mathematics, drawing, chemistry, sketching, English lan- 
guage, foreign language, geography, etc., according to the 
vocation in view — have all their own "logical" organ- 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 137 

izations which cannot, apparently, be disregarded. The 
mind of the pupil therefore is divided and follows to the 
end different tracks of learning which do not intersect. 

In the " project method," the unit of productive or quasi- 
productive work becomes the correlation center. The logi- 
cal order of '' related subjects " is necessarily broken up. 
Units from the related subjects, where naturally connected 
with the projects, are used. Special units of instruction and 
even training thus become easily developed. 

At first, naturally, the method appears relatively cumber- 
some and wasteful; but in large measure this appearance 
may be due to persistent illusions as to the fruitfulness of 
method of formal instruction and training in related science. 
The academic mind especially is easily deceived into thinking 
that a pupil's glib mastery of textbook and laboratory chem- 
istry will " function " when he becomes a farmer or that a 
school girl's excellent reciting abilities in physics will con- 
stitute an asset in her work of homemaking. 

Furthermore, we have as yet few acceptable precedents 
for good vocational projects. We can easily supply pro- 
ductive jobs in vocational education; but the truly " educa- 
tional job" — the project — that possesses "root" con- 
nections with all naturally related fields of knowledge and 
ancillary skills has usually to be invented. For this work 
originating powers of a very high order are required, as 
well as conviction that profitable educational undertakings 
are to be developed in this direction — a combination not 
yet often found among educators. 

IV 

Problems of Method. — In no field are there more genuine 
" problems " of method than in that of vocational education. 
To what extent do the effects of specific training extend or 
transfer? To what extent can we "borrow" motive? 



138 Vocational Education 

Can vocational education be made to produce incidental 
'' moral values " of general importance ? 

Eif ects of the Theory of Formal Discipline In the field 

of vocational education no less than in the fields of moral 
and cultural education the theory of formal discipline 
has played a large part. Nearly all adults who have given 
no careful study to the questions believe yet that it is possible 
to teach " observation," to train in " concentration," to pro- 
duce " mechanical ingenuity." Common experience teaches 
us, of course, that we can, by training or instruction, pro- 
duce endless specific powers ; but can we, by teaching certain 
specific powers very fully, and carefully, produce general 
powers ? 

Suppose a boy is taught to be very accurate in driving 
nails, or in using a hand-saw in making small building parts ; 
will he be found more accurate as a consequence in laying 
bricks or in soldering tinware ? The question is not simple, 
and psychological experiments to date do not give wholly 
decisive answers. Obviously what the boy does in brick- 
laying or tinsmithing will depend not only on the skills and 
knowledge which he brings, but upon his desires, his ap- 
preciations, his ideals. It may be that when he began wood 
working he had little interest in accurate work. As a re- 
sult of his first work in carpentry he develops either a fear 
of the consequences of turning in bad work, or a pride in 
work that is commended. He may bring to tinsmithing 
no skills, but he may bring desires, which will enable him 
to learn faster. 

All recent studies seem to indicate, however, that parents, 
educators and employers tend to expect too much from the 
possible " transfer " of training. It is endlessly argued that 
study of plane geometry develops " reasoning powers," that 
study of Latin or botany teaches "observation," that men- 
tal arithmetic begets concentration, and that manual train- 
ing really trains the hand, as the name implies, and also 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 139 

trains the mind in exactness, accuracy, etc. It is even pos- 
sible to find persons who argue that once a boy has learned 
to saw " squarely," his moral character thereafter will be 
much more " square " than it would otherwise have been. 
It requires only moderate experience to show that in these 
contentions there is some truth, probably much error, and 
unquestionably a great deal of confusion, due to use of 
ambiguous words. Of course the study of plane geometry 
trains in '' reasoning powers " — not reasoning powers of 
all kinds, assuredly, but those peculiarly required for the 
problems of geometry. Is there such a thing as ** reasoning 
power" in general? Or a ''faculty" of reasoning? 
'' Probably not," is the answer of modern psychology. At 
any rate the words are too vague and equivocal to be of 
service to the educator. 

Nevertheless we may expect to find many consequences of 
the doctrine of formal discipline long persisting in the peda- 
gogy of vocational education. For years it was believed 
that the specific powers acquired in manual training would 
" carry over " into the trades. It was contended that a 
learner habituated to the wood lathe would thereby acquire 
a stock of powers that would serve him in learning the use 
of any rotary machinery. At least he would have learned 
the '' principles " — those vague abstractions so dear to the 
academic mind. At present it is held by many that if a 
young person has learned salesmanship — e.g. of books — 
he becomes thereby equipped in an important degree to be a 
salesman of, e.g., automobiles, or in other words he has ac- 
quired the basic '' principles " of salesmanship. Many of 
the abstract studies found in commercial courses are de- 
signed to give knowledge of principles — perhaps skill of a 
'' general " nature in a few cases — for use in business life. 

Vocational Motives. — One of the formidable problems 
confronting the advocates of prolonged school attendance 
for all children is that of stimulating active interests in, or 



I40 Vocational Education 

motives for, the work to be taken. Lately certain writers 
have recommended the enhstment of vocational motives. 
The Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Edu- 
cation has gone so far as to recommend that the principal 
offerings of the senior high school should center in certain 
" broad " vocational courses. The intent of this is not so 
much to assure vocational education as it is to utilize voca- 
tional motives as '' holding powers " for general, and espe- 
cially for civic, education. 

But if the interpretations of vocational education made in 
this book are sound it will not prove practicable to substitute 
for it camouflaged general education. To a large extent that 
has been done for years in commercial education, but here 
the schools had the advantage of the aspirations of the chil- 
dren or working people to rise to ^' higher " callings, the 
gateways to which appeared to be only the commercial 
schools. It is very doubtful if interest in " blended " com- 
mercial courses could be maintained, if these were in active 
competition with courses of genuine vocational training for 
the commercial callings. Manual training and technical 
high schools have attracted large numbers of students, not, 
it is probable, because of direct appeals to vocational mo- 
tives, but because these schools have offered college pre- 
paratory courses and general education more attractive to 
certain kinds of temperament than the courses of the clas- 
sical schools. 

It is, therefore, greatly to be doubted whether the pro- 
longation of interest in liberal education, for pupils of av- 
erage abilities and perhaps little taste for the academic, can 
be affected by the sincere and effective use of vocational 
motives. If honest and straightforward vocational education 
is provided it will drive out the '' blended " type. But it is the 
responsibility of educators so to improve their offerings of 
liberal education that these will not require the adventitious 
aid of vocational motives. 



Principles of Method in Vocational Education 141 

Students of human nature as well as psychologists are well 
aware of the existence in all normal human beings of what 
may well be called *' workmanship " instincts. These mani- 
fest themselves universally in children whose play and games 
are patterned largely after productive activities; in youth 
who show besetting impulses to use the tools and to imitate 
the work of elders; and in the outcroppings of ''creative" 
impulses among adults. 

But we are still very much in the dark as to how far these 
instinctive tendencies alone supply motive force for modern 
conditions. Often they seem to rise but little above the 
levels characteristic of primitive social life. They seem ex- 
cessively dependent upon the play spirit. Only under strong 
extraneous motives, often, can men and women be depended 
upon to " work hard," to subject themselves to painful rou- 
tines, to postpone pleasurable '' excursions." Everyone v^^ho 
has tried to assist the poor and irresponsible, to hold adoles- 
cents to systematic effort, or to organize for productive pur- 
poses the dwellers in warm climates or the primitive humans 
of any part of the world knows how imperfectly functional 
for the conditions created by crowded populations, large uti- 
lization of natural forces, and rising standards of living are 
the motives dependent directly upon instincts of workman- 
ship. 

But social life abounds with examples of the successful 
use of extraneous motives. Strong men early learned to 
drive their fellows to work by fear. The desire for " gain " 
— that is, for much-wanted consumable or capital goods — 
can be extensively utilized. Desire for approval (or to es- 
cape disapproval ) plays a very large part in holding modern 
man to toil. Finally, habituation, rendering that which was 
unpleasant, pleasant in time, and drying up the fountains of 
competing incentives, makes toil welcome and even neces- 
sary. Thus civilized society makes the worker, the man of 
routine, the provident investor, the inventor, the power har- 
nesser. 



142 Vocational Education 

We know little as yet relative to the use of vocational mo- 
tives in schools. With young learners we have counted too 
heavily upon the instincts to produce. We have seen city 
children from a starved environment take with avidity to 
tools when given opportunity and we have too readily in- 
ferred that these new-born interests were capable of holding 
them for a thousand hours per year no less than for a half 
dozen a week. We have learned that even adults, stimu- 
lated by a knowledge of their inferior earning powers, will 
rarely persist in '' long " courses in evening schools, but that 
the incentive of a " short unit " course, if it be concrete and 
visibly related to the day's work, is sufficient to produce 
valuable results. 

The writer is strongly of the opinion that in all 
schools of basic vocational education we must yet utilize the 
motive of gain. Only in agricultural schools now can the 
worker enrich himself from the proceeds of his project. It 
will be found that no better investment can be made than to 
give the learner the net money value (barring cost of in- 
struction) of the productive work he does in learning. 

Moral Values of Vocational Education. — Sound voca- 
tional education will, of course, produce the specific moral 
virtues characteristic of the given vocation. The specific 
fidelities, loyalties, thoroughnesses, and honesties, and other 
ideals thus produced are, of course, assets or factors in that 
composite of virtues, known as " good citizenship," " moral 
character," and the like. 

But how far can we rely upon vocational education to 
produce virtues, that will apply outside the vocation? The 
world is familiar with the fact that often a conscientious 
workman is not a good father or voter, that a man may be 
the soul of honor with business associates and yet easily 
capable of dishonorable action towards others. Loyal sol- 
diers are often blind to public interests. A hardworking 
farmer may be stingy and a monopolist. 



Principles oj Method in Vocational Education 143 

Probably we are deceived by the fact that among adults 
our first and most prevalent valuations of men and women 
are in terms of their vocations. Has a man's law school 
education and his lawyer's experience given him the " vir- 
tues " of a good lawyer? We first appraise him therefor. 
Is a manual worker punctual, industrious, careful of tools, 
habituated to give conscientious workmanship? Our first 
valuation is that he is a good citizen generally. 

Inductive study of examples of this kind will probably 
make clear in the first place the large part played in good 
citizenship by the specific vocational virtues and also the pre- 
vailing tendency of reasoning to ascribe to the approved 
man's education the native virtues that have in reality come 
into prominence as a result of selective processes. Prob- 
ably the man who is so endowed by nature that he easily be- 
comes a good workman is also similarly endowed with many 
of the qualities that develop into non-vocational virtues. 

The entire subject needs examination. Quite possibly 
skillful teaching at the right moment would be able to " ex- 
tend " or " transfer " into non-vocational areas, if not the 
habit and knowledge elements of vocational virtues then in 
process of formation, at least their *' appreciative," " aspi- 
rational " or "idealistic elements." A boy caught in decep- 
tive work can readily be inspired and even trained not to 
repeat that misdeed. Skillful teaching (the simple old mor- 
alizing, goody-goody " stuff " will not '' go " with a real 
American boy) might then develop appreciation and ideals 
of very general application. 



CHAPTER V 

VOCATIONAL EDUCATION FOR THE AGRICULTURAL 

CALLINGS 

I 

According to the 14th U. S. Census, there were in 1910 
engaged in the pursuit of agriculture in the United 
States a total of over 12,600,000 persons (see classifications 
on page 515). The variety and value of the products of 
farms are summarized in the following tables : 

Table I. Value of All Crops, United States, 1909 

(Compiled from 14th U. S. Census, 1910) 

All Crops $5,487,000,000 

Cereals 2,665,000,000 

Corn 1,438,000,000 

Oats 414,600,000 

Wheat 657,600,000 

Barley 92,458,000 

Buckwheat 9,330,500 

Rye 20,421,000 

Kaffir corn and milo maize 10,816,000 

Emmer and spelt 5,584,000 

Rough rice 16,118,600 

Other grains and seeds 97,576,000 

Dry edible beans 21,700,000 

Other beans 241,000 

Dry peas 10,963,700 

Peanuts 18,271,900 

Flaxseed 28,900,500 

Miscellaneous seeds 768,625 

Grass seed 15,137,683 

Flower and vegetable seed 1,411,000 

Hay and forage 824,004,877 

Tobacco 104,302,866 

Cotton and cotton seed 824,696,200 

Cotton 703,619,300 

Cottonseed 121,076,900 

144 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 145 

Table I. Value of All Crops, United States, 1909 {Continued) 

Sugar crops $61,600,900 

Sugar beets 19,800,700 

Sorghum cane 10,170,400 

Sugar cane 26,405,952 

Maple sugar and syrup 5,177,800 

Other minor crops 18,608,000 

Broom corn 5,134,434 

Hemp 412,699 

Hops 7,844,745 

All other 595,674 

Vegetables 418,110,154 

Potatoes 166,423,500 

Sweet potatoes and yams 35,429,000 

Other vegetables 216,257,000 

Fruits and nuts 222,124,216 

Small fruit 29,974,480 

Strawberries 17,913,900 

Blackberries and dewberries 3,900,800 

Raspberries and loganberries 5,130,200 

Cranberries 1,755,600 

All other ^ . . . . 1,200,000 

Orchard fruits 140,860,300 

Apples 83,231,400 

Peaches and nectarines 28,781,000 

Pears 7,910,000 

Plums and prunes 10,299,400 

Cherries 7,200,000 

Apricots 2,800,000 

All other. 529,400 

Grapes 22,027,900 

Tropical and sub-tropical fruits 24,700,000 

Oranges 17,500,000 

Lemons 2,900,000 

Pomeloes (grapefruit) 2,060,000 

Figs 803,800 

Pineapples 734,000 

Olives 404,400 

All other 143,467 

Nuts 4,447,600 

Almonds 711,900 

Pecans 971,596 

Walnuts (Persian or English) 2,297,336 

Another 466,772 

Flowers and plants 34,872.300 

Nursery products . 21,050,822 

Forest products of farms 195,306,283 



146 Vocational Education 

Table II. Live Stock on Farms 

(Compiled from 14th U. S. Census for 1910) 

Value, 1910. 

Total $4,925,000,000 

Cattle 1,499,000,000 

'Horses 2,083,000,000 

Mules 525,000,000 

Asses 13,000,000 

Swine 400,000,000 

Sheep 232,000,000 

Goats 6,000,000 

Poultry 154,000,000 

Bees 10,000,000 

The foregoing figures suggest the magnitude of Ameri- 
can agricuhural interests but they give no satisfactory anal- 
ysis of the farming vocations as found throughout the states. 
From the point of view of one type of writer, farming is 
" just farming," and to talk of a large number and variety 
of specific vocations within it is almost absurd. From an- 
other point of view, however, there are scores of different 
vocations presenting '' common principles " only in the last 
analysis and to the mind exceptionally capable of grasping 
abstract principles. 

There is greatly needed, for purposes of organizing and 
administering vocational schools of agriculture, an extensive 
and concrete analysis of present degrees of specialization of 
the agricultural vocations, together with forecasts of prob- 
able future tendencies. The term " general farming " so 
freely used by not a few writers is thoroughly misleading. 
Quite obviously no "general farmer" in Massachusetts in- 
cludes oranges, cotton or beet sugar among his products. 
Farmers in Mississippi do not usually produce raisin grapes, 
cranberries, or considerable numbers of beef cattle. In the 
settlement of the frontier there was once a type of general 
farming the aim of which, supplemented by hunting and fish- 
ing, was to produce as nearly as practicable all the commod- 
ities a family required. Now only the rare farmer expects to 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 147 

meet fifty per cent or even twenty per cent of his cost of liv- 
ing from his own products. He works primarily to produce 
one or more marketable crops or live-stock products. The 
primary aim of the efficient school of agriculture must be to 
give competency in producing and marketing these " major " 
products over a series of years. Secondary to these are 
many other minor aims to be considered. For much inter- 
esting data consult G. F. Warren's Farm Management, 
Macmillan, 1914. 

II 

Agricultural Schools The primary aim of the vo- 
cational school of agriculture is therefore to produce, for 
a given area and given economic conditions, the success- 
ful farmer. Excluding farm laborers there are in this 
country probably 9,000,000 farmers. It is the most numer- 
ously followed vocation in the country, after homemak- 
ing. It may well be assumed that, in the not distant 
future, every man seeking success as a farmer will, at 
some stage of his preparation, desire the aid of a voca- 
tional school. It is not conceivable that the agricultural 
colleges can meet this demand, even if their primary aims 
were to train farmers. Agricultural colleges, with their 
degree requirements and facilities for research, can be 
expected to train large numbers of persons who will serve 
in some " leadership " capacity — as technical experts, man- 
agers of large farms, etc. ; but to expect them to supply the 
training needed by the rank and file of farmers would be as 
reasonable as to assume that the technological institutions 
of the country can train the millions of trade and industrial 
workers required in our manufacturing and building pur- 
suits. 

If we presume that 30 years represents the average voca- 
tional " career " of the farmer it is evident that this group of 
callings requires not less than 300,000 recruits yearly. At 



148 Vocational Education 

present the great majority of these do not come to their 
work with any direct vocational training. They have been 
prepared, as have their forbears for thousands of years, and 
as are still nearly all tillers of the soil and stock-raisers in 
other countries, through the by-education of practical par- 
ticipation as child-helper and hired worker. Organized ap- 
prenticeship for the arts of tillage and live-stock rearing 
has probably never existed on an extensive scale. Probably 
the novice was his father's assistant in so many cases that 
formal indenture never seemed necessary. That the agri- 
cultural arts are successfully transmitted through the by-edu- 
cation of unorganized apprenticeship is demonstrated by the 
success of these arts in China, Belgium, Mexico and hun- 
dreds of other regions which have never possessed vocational 
schools of agriculture. As in the trades, this by-education 
seems fairly successful so long as the capital employed is 
small, the bulk of the work is performed by hand-driven or 
animal-driven, rather than power-driven, tools, and there is 
little need for the use of scientific knowledge. 

The need of vocational schools to train for the agricultural 
vocations has become felt only recently in America. In a 
vague way, probably, those persons who were responsible, 
even more than half a century ago, for the initiation and de- 
velopment of the agricultural colleges in America and other 
countries, thought or felt that these institutions would serve 
as agencies of vocational training for the actual callings of 
the farm. But in the majority of cases that has not hap- 
pened and probably could not happen. The agricultural 
colleges have done several kinds of splendid service, of which 
the training of experts to perform experimental and advi- 
sory functions for farmers, and the offering of extension 
education to farmers at work have been the two of greatest 
importance. But in the light of our present knowledge, we 
can hardly expect a series of vocations, the net labor return 
for which rarely exceeds fifteen hundred dollars yearly, and 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 149 

the modal yearly return for which, at least prior to the war, 
was hardly one thousand dollars, to command the kinds of 
ability and expensive training required to complete a college 
course. 

Varieties of Agricultural Education From the stand- 
point of successful farming, vocational agricultural educa- 
tion may be considered under several distinct heads : 

a. There is first the kind of education that can be given 
by an agricultural college requiring high school graduation 
as a condition for admission and giving a four year course 
leading to the degree of bachelor of science. This form of 
agricultural education is distinctly professional in its char- 
acter. It presupposes students of exceptional ability and 
ought to qualify them for positions of expert service or 
leadership in some capacity. 

b. Agricultural colleges have already developed exten- 
sive lines of " extension " instruction in agriculture. This 
work may be expected greatly to enlarge in the future. The 
essence of extension education is to be found in the fact that 
the persons taking it have already a basis of practical ex- 
perience on which to build. The types of extension teach- 
ing most successful in the agricultural college consist of 
short courses of from one to six or twelve weeks for farmers 
already at work, correspondence courses along special lines, 
extension lectures, and demonstration and experiment sta- 
tion work designed to meet the immediate problems of 
farmers. 

c. The technical school of agriculture for persons either 
already possessed of some practical experience in farm work, 
or likely to obtain such practical experience at an early date, 
while existing now in only a few scattered examples, prob- 
ably has an important future. The " agricultural school " 
department found in some agricultural colleges is of this 
type; so also are certain schools or so-called colleges of 
agriculture admitting students of sixteen years of age or 



150 Vocational Education 

upward and which are not insisting on any considerable 
educational prerequisite. Some county schools of agricul- 
ture and certain state institutions in New York deserve 
properly to be called technical schools of agriculture. 

d. For boys from twelve to sixteen the " Home Project 
Work," related to the " Corn " and " Pig " Club work of 
former years, has become a widely established and generally 
useful form of education carried on, like scouting and other 
voluntary activities, in the amateur spirit. As a contribu- 
tion to liberal education in the best meaning of that term this 
work is invaluable; but in no proper meaning of the term, 
probably, ought it to be called vocational, although to some it 
will give vocational appreciations and ideals. 

e. In a great variety of high schools in the United States 
are found agricultural courses, based chiefly upon textbooks 
and some laboratory work, with occasional individual or 
joint projects undertaken by the pupils. These can hardly 
be called schools of agriculture in the vocational sense. 

/. Finally, we note the vocational school of agriculture 
as such which undertakes to provide both for the practice 
and the related technical knowledge for the training of boys 
from fourteen to twenty years of age and within an area 
sufficiently small to insure a genuine mastery of vocational 
practice. This type of school usually proceeds through the 
use of a home project which becomes for the learner a 
project of economic importance expected to yield him per- 
haps not less than one hundred dollars net for a year's work. 
This project to be successful must be confined to some one 
definite field of agriculture, such as the raising of potatoes, 
the raising of a kitchen garden, the raising of a specified 
amount of poultry, the care of a specified number of dairy 
cows during the year, the economic management of a speci- 
fied area of orchard that is taken and improved and the 
product marketed. 

The types discussed may be analyzed in order of ages ap- 
pealed to, as follows : 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 151 







Development 
appreciation 


Practical power 
in vocation 


(U 

bfl 

n3 

OJ 

a 
1-1 

a 

OS 

to 


Technical 
specialization 


Improved practi- 
cal power 






Amateur home 
project 


Productive 
home project 


.2 

03 

2 ^ 

r] en 

d 

H 


Higher and 
special techni- 
cal instruction 


c 


.2 ^ 
c ■>-> 
X "3 

(U •■^ 






u 
a> 
03 

a 

< 


I 

03 

CJ 


> 

-(-> o3 

^.2 
Q 


1 

o3 


> 

^ a 
cS.2 
Q 


Partly voca- 
tional, partly 
additional 
generalization 


Effective mas- 
tery vocational 
specialty 




W3 

1-4 
< 

h-l 

Ph 


1 

OS 


a; 



Vocational for 
distinctive 
farm vocation 


Practical farm- 
ing 


Technical mas- 
tery for tech- 
nical speciali- 
zation 


Higher practical 
power 




1 
W 

w 


< 


< 


<v 

OS 
v-< 

a S 




High school 
graduate 






p 
w 

CL, ^ 

>< 


Amateur home 

project 
Boys, 12-16 


Vocational home 

project 
Boys, 14-18 


Technical 
Men, 18-30 


Professional 
Men, 18-24 


Extension 
Men, 20-50 



152 Vocational Education 

The Home Project School From the point of view of 

the writer, the only type of school of agricuhure that can 
probably succeed on an extensive scale in the future, is that 
described under / above. The reasons for this position 
are as follows : The economic practice of agriculture tends 
always towards specialization. The farmer who is making 
the largest financial return from his agriculture is the man 
who concentrates his efforts on the basis of scientific prin- 
ciples. This does not mean that only one crop in agricul- 
ture or one type of stock raising can give maximum economic 
success. In the first place, for certain areas of the country, 
rotation of crops must be practiced in order to insure max- 
imum utilization of soil. In the second place, successful 
farming often involves complementary processes, for ex- 
ample, where corn and hogs, beet sugar and cattle and the 
like are involved. Again, under some conditions, a farmer 
must have two or more lines of work in the event that one 
should prove an economic failure, as, for example, a farmer 
growing wheat in a region where perhaps in only two years 
out of three is the rainfall sufficient to guarantee raising 
crops. Under these conditions, farmers must have a dry 
weather crop as reserve. Finally, we know that the eco- 
nomic practice of agriculture involves such an adjustment of 
lines of production as will provide for the optimum use of 
machinery, equipment, and especially labor, throughout the 
year. Subject to conditions like the foregoing, it is re- 
peated, the economic practice of agriculture tends towards 
specialization. The man to succeed in any division of it 
must become more and more an expert in his particular field 
through scientific study, and furthermore, through delegat- 
ing where practicable such functions as purchase of ferti- 
hzers and seeds, disposal of product, the use of expensive 
machinery, to special agencies designed to make the maxi- 
mum use of these facilities. 

The program of a vocational school of agriculture should 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 153 

probably always rest on a one year basis because of the sea- 
sonal character of agriculture. A program of instruction 
in an agricultural vocational school should assume the avail- 
ability of at least six or eight hours of the pupil's time for 
six days per week throughout the year. This time might 
then be distributed so as to give four or five hours a day on 
the average to practice, perhaps two hours a day to related 
technical studies and perhaps an hour a day to general 
readings and conferences expected to develop social insight, 
this to include class reading of some one standard descriptive 
text of the agricultural vocations as practiced in various 
parts of the world and their relation to human well-being. 
The vocational training of the pupil, in this as in other 
schools and apart from the general '' social insight " course, 
probably will develop increasingly towards an individual 
instruction with only occasional conferences at which pupils 
and teachers will pool their common knowledge and experi- 
ence. 

But the program of an agricultural school must not pre- 
suppose the same distribution of time every day throughout 
the year. There must necessarily be two or three months 
during which the boy, for example, on a farm or crop proj- 
ect, should give his time exclusively to practice work. There 
will also be probably two or three months during which 
four, five, or six hours per day spent in the school would 
be sufficient. Finally, under some conditions, perhaps one 
or two school meetings per week, the remaining time to be 
given exclusively to practice on sub-projects, might be the 
best way of organizing instruction and practice. 

It is probable that division of the teaching force according 
to practical work and related technical work is almost cer- 
tainly destined to prove a failure. Only the man responsible 
for the supervision of the boy's practical work can be ex- 
pected satisfactorily to take charge of his related technical 
instruction in that field. 



154 Vocational Education 

It is essential that the boy should be the chief beneficiary 
of the net economic returns from his project. Experience 
has shown that a net return of $70 for a year's work for a 
boy 14-16 years of age should be regarded as a minimum, 
while ambitious and energetic boys should be able easily to 
earn a net return of at least $100. It goes without saying 
that accurate accounts must be kept with the project, so that 
all outlay for rent of land (and in dairy and fruit projects, 
interest on the capital represented by cows, fruit trees, etc. ) , 
tools, added labor in time of pressure, seed, fertihzer, and 
the rest should be deduced. 

From time to time, questions arise as to a desirable length 
of vocational agricultural course. As suggested above, 
every program should be based on the assumption that one 
year's work will complete for the time being the student's 
requirements as to agricultural skill and knowledge in a par- 
ticular project field. It should prove entirely within the 
possibilities of the school to offer the pupil a succession of 
projects even extending over four or five years if necessary. 
For example, a pupil might take as his first project the rais- 
ing of an acre of potatoes; as his second project, the raising 
of one hundred head of poultry; for his third project, the 
raising of a field crop of corn or potatoes or hay or wheat; 
and as his fourth year project, the care of four or six dairy 
cows. This, in a sense, would represent the accumulation 
of several vocational possibiHties. 

Debatable Issues.^ — The passage of the Smith-Hughes 
bill by Congress, making provision of national aid for the 
promotion of agricultural education of secondary grade, 
together with the many efforts now being made to promote 
agricultural production in the United States, bring into re- 

iThe following sections (pp. 154-164) are taken from an article in 
School and Society (January 19, 1918). The somewhat personal form 
is retained because it lends itself to definition of the issues in- 
volved. 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 155 

lief many debatable issues relative to agricultural education. 
Already, literally thousands of ordinary elementary and 
high schools throughout the country are making at least 
pretenses of offering agricultural instruction or training; 
while the 'Agricultural colleges and numerous special schools 
are rapidly bringing into view the various specific problems 
involved in making agricultural education really worth 
while. 

Dr. Theodore H. Eaton's recently published monograph, 
'' A Study of Organization and Method of the Course of 
Study in Agriculture in Secondary Schools," ^ is an impor- 
tant and valuable review and criticism of methods and at- 
tainments in the field of secondary agricultural education to 
date. In School and Society under the title " A Possible 
Core for a Program in Agricultural Education " ^ Dr. Eaton 
has outlined a fairly definite theory for the organization of 
agricultural instruction and one which manifestly deserves 
careful consideration. 

To the man engaged in the practical problem of trying to 
prepare a working curriculum for an agricultural school 
serving a given area and a given group of students, Dr. Ea- 
ton's *' core " will probably seem almost hopelessly large and 
complex, not to say vague and elusive. His analysis raises 
the question as to how far, in view of the uncertainties of 
educational terminologies, and the known predilections of 
educators for " omnibus " or " wholly " words, it is profit- 
able or desirable for writers to attempt to " generalize " agri- 
cultural education. 

Very rightly Dr. Eaton says : *' There are all kinds of 
farmers and all kinds of farms in all kind of places." He 
should have added " there are many possible kinds of agri- 
cultural education adapted to many kinds of boys and men 
according to the ends in view or objectives to be realized." 

^ Published by Teachers College, Columbia University, New York. 
2 School and Society, December 29, 1917. 



156 Vocational Education 

The greatest practical danger confronting the various states 
in their attempts to evolve workable schemes of agricultural 
education (danger, that is, of false starts, hurtful disillu- 
sionings, wasted resources and misdirected efforts of learn- 
ers) will certainly come from the attempts to train boys 
(and men) to be '' farmers " in the general sense — which 
is only a few steps short of that now discarded ideal of an 
older theory of vocational education which would train all 
to be *'men " (which is, of course, in spite of its vagueness, 
a right ideal of liberal, as distinguished from vocational, 
education). 

Now the first distinction of importance to note is the fact 
that sometimes the words *' agricultural education " refer to 
a very tangible purpose in general or liberal education where 
the ends in view have little or nothing to do with the voca- 
tions of tillage or stock raising; and sometimes to a very 
different thing, namely, the instruction and training destined 
to prepare a person, in whole or in part, for the successful 
pursuit of one of the many vocations of the soil. 

There is probably little need relatively for " liberal " agri- 
cultural education through schools in rural communities 
(especially when the regular schools provide illuminating 
reading that should increasingly be stimulated in upper 
grades), since here it comes in large measure as by-educa- 
tion from rural life itself. But in cities, and especially in 
large cities, where people are far removed from contact 
with rural vocations and from appreciation of the social, 
civic, aesthetic, intellectual, and physical characteristics of 
rural life and work, there is large need of genuine '' appre- 
ciation " courses in agriculture which can readily be given, 
with practical gardening, in schools for boys from twelve 
to eighteen years of age. " Home project " gardening, 
now being fostered by the national government, is a valu- 
able means to that end. On the other hand, it is folly to 
offer expensive education towards agricultural vocations 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 157 

except to those who will very probably repay society for its 
investment by their achievements as successful practition- 
ers of the vocations for which they have been trained. 
Hence vocational education in agriculture belongs chiefly to 
the country until it is demonstrated that substantial numbers 
of city boys will, in good faith, take it. 

Vocational Aims. — Within the field of vocational agri- 
cultural education it is also of no less importance that we 
analyze sharply the many scores of distinctive agricultural 
vocations for any one of which, in a complete system of 
school education, specific training could be given, and for 
each of which, of course, there has always been available 
the crude and poorly directed by-education obtained by 
younger persons working under the guidance of elders. 
The words '' agricultural education " ought to be used only 
as the words " professional education " are used — in a 
general sense, and not as descriptive of a field in which or 
for which a given individual should be prepared, or a single 
school organized. Let us imagine a college advertising to 
give " professional education " ; the immediate question is 
" For what profession? " We do not train dentists in the 
same way that w^e train lawyers; or journalists in the same 
way that we train electrical engineers. 

Similarly, we should cease to speak of so-called vocational 
schools as training " farmers " (at least schools of second- 
ary grade; and probably the same rule applied to agricul- 
tural colleges in the first and second years of their work 
would result in great improvement in their aims, methods, 
and results). Let us rather recognize the fact that some 
successful farmers of to-day are rendering to themselves 
and to the nation the best possible service by being success- 
ful poultry men; others through being successful growers 
of oranges and still others respectively as market gardeners, 
as *' potato kings," as apple growers, as mule-raisers, as 
growers of corn and hogs, as producers of milk. 



158 Vocational Education 

But in the vocational training which would make of one 
boy a successful poultry man, there is practically nothing in 
common with the training which would make another a 
successful apple-grower in Oregon, any more than there is 
in the training that would make of one youth a successful 
teacher of mathematics and another a successful stenog- 
rapher. The state of Texas might well afford to have a 
first class school to train youths of suitable age — fifteen 
years or upwards — successfully to follow the vocation of 
rice-growing; but such a school would be an absurdity in 
New England. On the other hand, ought not New England 
to have several good schools to train youths successfully to 
produce apples, or milk, or cranberries respectively ? 

There survives, of course, and especially in the Atlantic 
States, the tradition of the "all-round" farmer — the 
farmer who has two or three cows of rather low productiv- 
ity, a few hens, an assortment of fruit trees, a hay meadow, 
and a tilled section whereon he tries to grow corn, potatoes, 
and cabbage. Is it worth while to try to train a new gen- 
eration for that kind of '' agriculture " ? It had its attrac- 
tive sides doubtless, but it fits very poorly into the economy 
of the twentieth century. The all-round farmer must fol- 
low the jack-of-all-trades, the " general merchandise man," 
and the " handy man." 

There will remain, of course, " complementary farming " 
— complementary in the parallel sense, as where one farm 
produces corn for hogs and hogs for the market; or in the 
alternative sense, as where soil must, for its fullest health, 
have successive crops of corn, oats and clover. But in 
training a youth for one of these fields of agriculture, edu- 
cation in the technique of each complementary part would 
constitute but one stage of his unified training for the one 
agricultural vocation as experience demonstrates that to 
be best organized. 

But why does Dr. Eaton say " under a democratic form 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 159 

of government it is not possible to prognosticate with sure- 
ness that any boy will become a farmer, much less that he 
will take up a certain definite type of farming in a known 
locality " ? What bearing has that fact on the offering of 
definite programs of genuine vocational education towards 
any one or several of the numerous agricultural vocations? 
Suppose we say : '' Under a democratic form of government 
it is not possible to prognosticate with sureness that any boy 
will become a dentist or a bookkeeper or something else." 
Has that any bearing on the policy of establishing a good 
vocational school for those who make up their minds that 
they wish to be dentists in view of the fact that the market 
can yearly provide place for an ascertained number of new 
dentists ? 

If investigation in eastern Massachusetts shows that a 
substantial number of properly qualified young men can 
each year find profitable careers in specified types of market 
gardening, why should there not be provided a school, or 
department of a school, having the training of successful 
market gardeners as its distinctive end? Can we stop 
short of this in the logical evolution of publicly supported 
vocational education ? Is not this the only method by which 
education can be made truly democratic? Dr. Eaton him- 
self says: 

'' Indeed it is very desirable that such general analyses of 
different types of farm life in various regions be made (e.g. 
of the factors of successful life on a dairy farm in the New 
England states), if we are to succeed in a close adaptation 
of the educative process to individual and community needs." 

But after this, what is the need of a '' general scheme " to 
which the paper seems devoted ? 

*' The problem in any general scheme becomes one of 
study of the type activities, so far as such exist, inherent 
in a life spent in production from the soil." 

But does not this proposed " general scheme " lead us 



i6o Vocational Education 

again straight towards the educational mysticism (and, in 
the hands of reactionaries, obscurantism) which has so long 
baffled the development of good vocational education, and 
which, also, under the guises of " culture," " humanism," 
and '' mental discipline," has even baffled the development 
of anything like a truly democratic liberal education in the 
schools of the people? We need, indeed, general schemes 
of liberal or common or general education because through 
that we are laying foundations for general culture, com- 
mon morality, democratic ideals and patriotic citizenship; 
but in vocational education we must perforce follow the 
specialization produced by economic forces which the 
schools can no more control than they can control the motion 
of the planets. 

Specialization of Function. — One can agree with much 
that Dr. Eaton says regarding the desirability of having 
"type projects" (in vocational agricultural education) in- 
clude " complete cycles of production " even when these in- 
clude the primary elements of " production " as well 
as the secondary elements of '' distribution." But unless 
this ideal is interpreted in its quantitative as well as 
in its qualitative aspects, there is every probability that our 
agricultural schools will have their young learners flounder- 
ing and bemired in endless swamps of unassimilable technical 
knowledge (the figure is not nearly so mixed as the actual 
situation depicted — - which can still be observed at first hand 
in many of the agricultural schools the work of w^hich is 
described in Dr. Eaton's book). It is especially in this con- 
nection that educators must get into touch with the tend- 
encies of the age. 

" A man who is his own lawyer has a fool for a client." 
The man who tries to doctor his sick child may be prose- 
cuted. As long as the orange-growers of California tried 
each to market his own product, they lost more money than 
they made; when they delegated marketing to experts, the 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings i6i 

market was stabilized and rendered a certain source of rea- 
sonable profit. V/hy has the corporation, as a form of 
economic organization, come to dominate so many fields of 
production and exchange? Because it best provides for 
specialization and delegation of service. We are constantly 
praying farmers to '' cooperate "; but such cooperation gets 
nowhere unless with it there comes employment of special- 
ists and delegation of function. The apple-growers of the 
northwest have nothing to do at first hand with the stand- 
ards of packing of their apples any more than a patient in 
a hospital has to do with the running of the hospital. These 
apple-growers have been wise enough to recognize their 
own limitations — and also wise enough to know the value 
of employed specialized service (becoming expert just be- 
cause it is specialized) when that service is carefully chosen 
and its output scrutinized. In other words, these farmers, 
as regards packing fruit, do just what all intelligent men do 
in the use of medical and other specialized service — they 
learn to distinguish the false from the true, the efficient 
from the inefficient, and then delegate responsibility. 

Now, in the framing of plans of vocational education for 
agricultural schools we must go chiefly to the practice of 
successful modern farmers for guidance. We must dis- 
tinguish sharply between those capacities or powers of the 
successful farmer involved in abilities to do, to execute, or 
to perform, and those other capacities or powers involved 
in abilities to appreciate the need of the services of others 
and to appraise or evaluate that service when rendered by 
them. The range of the former requirement narrows year 
by year as civilized society becomes more complex ; while the 
range of the latter widens. In the process of distributing 
the meat products of the country there has evolved a tech- 
nology so complicated that no one man can grasp more than 
part of it; what should or can be the cattle grower's knowl- 
edge or appreciation of that technology? 

M 



1 62 Vocational Education 

We have in view here a problem of educational objectives 
as to which I think Dr. Eaton has the correct prospective, 
but which he seems to have failed to set forth clearly in the 
article referred to. It is a problem in discussing which we 
need help from the analogies of local and marginal fields 
of vision, or of primary and secondary returns (product and 
by-product) in any field of economic production. For con- 
crete illustration, let us take the case of a class of boys of 
sixteen who have elected to prepare themselves for poultry- 
raising as a vocation. 

It is clear that each of these boys in his earliest year-round 
project must learn by first-hand experience to do the neces- 
sary work of feeding, sheltering, and guarding a workable 
number of chickens. Should he learn to build an incubator? 
Probably not; specialists can do that far better than he. 
How far should he learn the principles of its operation — as 
far as he knows the principles of operation of the watch that 
he carries, or as far as he is expected to know the principles 
of his father's automobile which he drives? Clearly he 
must learn so much of the mechanism, in each case, as is 
essential to his responsibilities in the operation of it — and 
the age moves steadily towards " fool-proof " machinery. 

The boy has to buy most of the food for his poultry. 
What does he most need to know ( remembering that he has 
only one thousand hours in w^hich to learn, under school 
direction, all that he expects to get relative to poultry-rais- 
ing) about the available foodstuffs? Here the purpose is 
to make him a good buyer — a good appreciator or ap- 
praiser of the services of others. Conceivably, the best 
advice that can be given him is to consult an expert and 
abide by his recommendation, rather than to try to be his 
own lawyer, and to awaken too late to the fact that he has 
a fool for a client. 

Focal and Marginal Fields. — In other words, at every 
stage in successful vocational education towards one of the 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 163 

agricultural vocations there must be a small focal field in 
which skill of planning and performance is the controlling 
objective, and towards the attainment of which skill daily 
hard work, rigid thinking and painstaking reading must be 
insisted on. Here, thoroughness, accuracy, industriousness, 
conscientiousness, in the senses ordinarily thought of by 
master workmen, army officers and disciplinarians gener- 
ally, must dominate. 

But besides this there may be a very wide marginal field, 
a mental and physical penumbra, in which the objectives are 
less clearly defined, and in one sense less important. Here 
general reading, an occasional lecture, incidental reflection, 
and other means of unforced education or even by-educa- 
tion (by-product education) may well suffice. If we could 
clearly define and illustrate the differences of the two classes 
of objectives here referred to, a paper on agricultural edu- 
cation would not dismay us by its apparent insistence that 
for one group of projects, the related '' technological study 
will cover the chemistry of plant and animal life, the physics 
and chemistry of soils, tillage, manuring, drainage, irriga- 
tion, plant and animal pathology and sanitation, economic 
entomology, feeding; and the implications lead to botany, 
zoology, geology and geography as well as to the sciences 
already mentioned." 

The writer suggests the following as one method of study 
for educators bent on working out curricula of vocational 
school education for the agricultural vocations. There are 
in America perhaps ten million men now following these 
vocations. Of these perhaps five million are reasonably 
successful, having in view, on the one hand, their native en- 
dowments and the opportunities made available by nature in 
the regions where they live ; and, on the other, the standards 
by which we judge successful performance in other fields 
for persons of corresponding abilities and natural opportu- 
nities — physicians, high school teachers, retail merchants, 
artisans, sailors, hotel-keepers, teamsters, etc. 



164 Vocational Education 

Now, what are the powers (of personal execution) and 
capacities (for appreciation of powers of others) typically 
found in these successful farmers — appraised quantita- 
tively as well as qualitatively — according to their sev- 
eral specialties — market gardener, wheat-grower, cotton 
grower, dairymen selling milk to creamery, etc. ? 

Which of these specific powers and appreciations has been 
acquired at too great cost because, in the absence of direct 
vocational education in schools, the man had to get them via 
the wasteful by-education of experience? In what specific 
respects have these men failed to attain powers and appre- 
ciations which a good school could give? Until we shall 
have made some such analysis as this, it is to be feared that 
our school programs of vocational education for the farm- 
ing vocations will be bookish, academic, theoretical, because 
they will aspire to be to the fullest extent general, techni- 
cal, and scientific. Educators are slow to learn due modera- 
tion of ambition and demands. They often aspire to con- 
quer the world only to find that they have lost even the 
homestead. 

Ill 

Problems Several very unsettled problems as to the 

careers probably open to the boy trained in some variety of 
farming still await solution. Some of these grow out of 
the fact that in many parts of America farming is only now 
passing out of the hands of those who, on homesteaded pub- 
lic lands, redeemed their land from its original natural con- 
ditions. Others are due to the enlarging part played by 
capital in modern, and especially American, agriculture. A 
third set of problems arises from the temptations presented 
by industrial, commercial and even professional occupations 
to young men who have ability and can obtain prolonged 
education but who do not expect soon to possess capital. 



Vocational Education for the AgricuUtiral Callings 165 

1. The Acquisition of Land Throughout the entire his- 
tory of America, until near the close of the 19th century, 
the youth or young man desirous of beginning work as an 
independent farmer could easily find fresh land " to the 
west," Frequently he could secure title to this during the 
years that he was working for wages, acquiring a small cap- 
ital and farming experience. Furthermore, as the region 
settled and transportation conditions improved, even his 
imperfectly cleared and cultivated land gained steadily in 
value. A sober, hard-working man, notwithstanding very 
incomplete training as tiller of the soil or stock breeder, 
would often find himself comparatively early in life the pos- 
sessor of considerable wealth — he had become the inde- 
pendent, managing, capital-owning farmer in whom America 
has taken such pride. He it was whom the sociologist Ross 
had in mind when he wrote that it was doubtful if any other 
act of legislative body, American or European, had con- 
ferred so many blessings on humanity as our " homestead 
law " which provided in large part for the disposal of pub- 
lic lands west of the Alleghenies. 

What will be the history of the generations of farmers 
yet to come? We must assume that usually the beginner 
in this, as in almost all other vocations, must start with little 
or no capital and with only small and precarious credit. 
Commercial and industrial fields of work have simplified 
the situation by opening endless opportunities for the young 
man to begin as wage-earner, or as learner on some form 
of commission basis, and, as he accumulates capital and 
experience, to work into more responsible positions and even 
to use his capital in " the firm." Agriculture, too, offers 
endless openings for the hired worker; but does it, or can 
it, offer similar or equal opportunities for advancement, for 
the " investment " of special training, experience, and work- 
ing capital? That is not yet clear. In the older states, it 
is noted that tenant farming is steadily increasing. Prob- 



1 66 Vocational Education 

ably much of this is due to the supplanting of the older 
generation of farmers by younger or more vigorous immi- 
grants. But it is to be expected that many of the sons of 
farmers will themselves begin their careers on other than 
a " hired labor " basis, as renters or tenants — on their par- 
ents' land or elsewhere. At what age and under what con- 
ditions will a young man probably thus become a self- 
directing farmer? Undoubtedly, the answers to this ques- 
tion will have much to do in determining the scope and char- 
acter of the vocational agricultural education to be given in 
the full-time school of farming. If a youth, say eighteen 
years of age, must expect to spend five or six years merely 
as a hired man or helper, perhaps largely on an " occasional 
job " or " casual labor " basis to an active farmer, then it 
remains still an open question as to how far it is expedient 
or profitable to teach him in detail the arts and sciences of 
farming practice — manual performance or managerial — 
during his adolescent years. If, on the other hand, agri- 
cultural production w'ere so organized, or could be so organ- 
ized, that the young man, on graduating from a school of 
agriculture, could put his skill, knowledge, and powers of 
planning into actual practice, as is so largely the case now 
in the industrial and commercial callings, then there would 
exist the best of reasons why these schools should be ex- 
tensively developed and why prospective farmers in large 
numbers should take advantage of their offerings. 

We do not yet know, of course, how far vocational train- 
ing can be kept effectively in " cold storage." That is, 
we cannot tell how far the skill, technical knowledge, and 
managerial ability developed in a youth of eighteen will 
survive until he is twenty-six if he be given little opportu- 
nity in the meantime to put his powers in these lines into 
active and responsible practice — responsible, that is, in 
the sense that his success or failure in any given practical 
project will depend upon his own skill, his own knowledge, 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 167 

his own planning and managing ability. It seems to be an 
unfortunate fact that the average farmer, and perhaps the 
successful farmer most of all, is disposed to give to his em- 
ployed subordinates, and even to his own sons, little oppor- 
tunity for taking the initiative or exercising independent 
judgment. Quite frequently he shows no desire even to re- 
ceive their suggestions or advice. . 

It is possible that farmers whose sons work out " home 
projects " in practical schools of agriculture can be per- 
suaded to see the very great value of allowing these boys, on 
completing the requirements of schools of agriculture, to 
share in the direction of the home farm on some form of 
minor partnership basis. Obviously, the directors of these 
schools should actively interest themselves in the after 
careers of their pupils, for otherwise a large part of the ex- 
pensive training of these schools is apt to prove " non- 
functional." 

2. Enlarging Capital Units. — Even more difficult prob- 
lems are found in the shifting status of agriculture as re- 
gards the normal amount of capital investment required 
for most profitable farming in most parts of the United 
States. In many parts of the country the best farming now 
involves a capital investment in land, building and tools of 
from $10,000 to $50,000. Only exceptional persons, work- 
ing on their own resources, can hope to accumulate a capital 
of even $10,000 by middle age. Farmers' sons, belonging 
as they do, to a capital owning class, may expect to inherit 
the ancestral capital eventually; but, unless American farm- 
ers should elect to repeat the disastrous practice of French 
land-owners in closely limiting the size of families, each 
son could expect to inherit only from one fourth to one 
sixth of the ancestral property, and, of course, that inher- 
itance will, on the average, only take place when the repre- 
sentative of the new generation himself reaches middle age. 

There can be no question but that the greatest crisis con- 



1 68 Vocational Education 

fronting the present individualistic organization of agri- 
culture in America is due to the enlarging use of capital 
made necessary by progress of invention and specialization 
on a territorial basis of production. There are those who 
hope and anticipate that intensive farming on small lots of 
valuable land will enable us to preserve the status of the 
independent, land-owning farmer with capital of from $1000 
to $10,000. But this will certainly necessitate either some 
form of collective ownership of teams, power-driven tools, 
sources of water supply, storage apparatus, and the like; or 
else the complete relegation of these to corporations, as has 
been the case in sugar production, butter and cheese pro- 
duction, fruit packing, meat packing, etc. Collective owner- 
ship by land-owning farmers themselves of necessary ad- 
juncts seems to have proved successful only in some cases 
of water supply (for irrigation), fruit packing, and grain- 
storing plants, etc. Community ownership of ditching and 
tilling apparatus and expensive breeding stock has proved 
successful also in some cases, but against these we have to 
place the rapid growth of privately and separately owned 
elevators, threshing outfits, seed and fertilizer supplying 
agencies, and high grade breeding animals. It may be (and 
for social reasons it is to be feared) that the amounts of 
capital hereafter necessary in agriculture of the kind which, 
over the generations, will yield the maximum amounts of 
product (by which test any form of agriculture will eventually 
rise or fall) will compel corporate ownership and direction 
of nearly all if not all the immediate and related factors in 
this field of production, as has already become the case in 
manufacture, transportation of commodities, distance com- 
munication, exchange of commodities, capital investment, 
etc. Corporation-conducted agriculture would, of course, 
offer greater opportunities for the trained man possessing 
no capital than does the present situation. 

It is possible that governmental provision of working or 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 169 

" turn-over" capital (not capital for fixed investment, at 
least in land) will help solve some of the difficulties presented 
to young- men who can rent land and possess the qualities 
and characteristics necessary to obtain credit. But it is 
doubtful whether this stage can be reached, for the average 
man, under twenty-five to thirty years of age. 

3. Leaving the Farm. — The refusal in many cases of 
farmers' sons to become farmers themselves is a very old 
phenomenon, but one which has not greatly disturbed stu- 
dents of social problems until recently. " The drift from 
the country to the city " has been in large part, for the nine- 
teenth century, a quite normal and inevitable result of eco- 
nomic transformation, whereby the professional, industrial, 
commercial, and transporting occupations, which have in all 
civilized countries expanded much more rapidly than agri- 
culture during the nineteenth century, have been concen- 
trated in or about urban centers. The increasing use of 
machinery in tillage and harvesting has greatly diminished 
the amounts of labor required to give a stated quantity of 
farm products. 

Furthermore, the status of that man who possessed in- 
sufficient ability or capital (or both) to become at least a 
tenant farmer, and who must therefore earn a living as a 
wage-earner, has long been far less satisfactory in the coun- 
try than in the town, and conspicuously so if he had a family. 
Continuity of labor, shelter while working, available quar- 
ters to be rented for his family, inexpensive diversions and 
recreations, — all these the laboring man has been able to 
find more or less abundantly in industrial and commercial 
centers, while they were exceedingly precarious in rural 
areas. Farms conducted on the scale and under the con- 
ditions common in America require large amounts of hired 
labor for certain short seasons. But the owner and his fam- 
ily commonly supply all the labor needed during the re- 
mainder of the year. In many sections of America this 



lyo Vocational Education 

condition has produced either a permanent scarcity of farm 
labor (even while immigration to the country has been at its 
maximum) or else has been met by the stimulation of a 
flow of casual labor of a highly irresponsible kind, con- 
sisting chiefly of single men who can live during the dull 
seasons by methods well known to the semi-vagrant. 

From the standpoint of the rural sociologist the " drift 
to the city," has seemed chiefly objectionable because of its 
tendency to carry away the keenest, most enterprising sons 
of the soil. As in the case of the diminished birth-rate 
which dismays the student of eugenics, it is differential 
tendencies in favor of the least fit that constitute the real 
menace, not the phenomenon as a whole. In some sections, 
almost the entire original agricultural population has dis- 
appeared, leaving the land in the possession of recent im- 
migrants as tenants. In other places, selective emigration 
of the more enterprising has been so long in process that the 
remaining inhabitants seem to be, socially, and even biologi- 
cally in some cases, literally " dregs." 

And the end of this selective movement citywards is not 
yet, largely for the reasons given above relative to the diffi- 
culties experienced by a young man in getting " started " in 
independent farming. The ladder of ascent to competency 
and independence is, for many, far easier and more satis- 
factory in the non-agricultural callings. 

It is obvious that administrators and teachers of voca- 
tional education for the farming vocations must study these 
problems and take heed of the results of research even now 
being promoted towards their solution. Programs of al- 
leged vocational education formed in obliviousness to the 
significance of these problems will result in waste of public 
funds and forfeiture of public confidence. 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 171 

IV 

The " Project " Method of Teaching Agriculture may best 
be understood from a summary of the conditions which 
ideally might be expected to prevail : 

1. The '' school " for one teacher consists of two rooms, 
the first, a classroom including office for the instructor, the 
second, a reading room for pupils, both designed to afford, 
at the maximum, accommodations for twenty persons. These 
rooms may be in a local high or elementary school, a small 
house, or a vacant store. 

2. To be admitted to the school, a pupil must: (a) be 
at least fourteen years of age and have completed minimum 
requirements of elementary school attendance; (6) be pre- 
pared to give at least 1200 hours per year to practical work 
and 400 hours to related reading, study and class work, the 
whole time to be distributed to the best advantage of the 
project he undertakes; (c) be able to obtain on a rental basis 
from his father (or other responsible source) sufficient 
land, live stock, seeds, fertilizers, tools, supplemental labor, 
and new capital investment, properly to execute a project; 
(0?) be able to obtain stipulations that products supplied to 
the home from his project shall be paid for exactly as if pur- 
chased in the market. 

3. The instructor shall be a man possessing, on the one 
hand, technical college training, at least along the line of 
the projects which it is desirable to have taught locally; and 
also practical experience in the successful management of a 
farm or of projects on a commercial basis. He shall be ex- 
pected to spend an average of not less than sixty hours per 
year in actual contact with the projects of each boy at the 
scene of this work; and he should be provided with the best 
means of travel for this purpose that local conditions re- 
quire (in densely settled areas, street car or foot travel will 
serve; in more scattered areas, motorcycle, automobile, 



172 Vocational Education 

buggy, or saddle horse). The instructor, having from ten to 
twenty boys (a larger number will usually be impracti- 
cable), should be prepared to give full time to his teaching 
work (except a vacation period during December and Jan- 
uary or other months of little farming activity) and only 
incidental time to community^ service or expert work apart 
from teaching. 

4. The standards of the school shall require that each 
boy undertake a project of sufficient magnitude and prob- 
able value to yield him a reasonable labor return (or labor 
and profit returns distinguished) for his work after rentals, 
wages, and borrowings shall have been met. For a boy 
fifteen years old, accustomed to farm labor, a net labor 
return of nine cents per hour ($100 to $108 for the year of 
1200 hours) would probably not be unreasonable (1919 
prices). For an older boy and especially for a boy working 
on a second year project, ten cents an hour would be reason- 
able. If the learner rents cows, horses, orchard trees, hives 
of bees, or the like, from his father, some arrangement for 
insurance against capital loss (e.g. by death of animal) 
should be made. 

5. For each approved project the school should supply 
a booklet describing stages, sub-projects, and giving ample 
general directions, including for each step a list of page 
references to books, bulletins, and other reading available in 
the library. The learner must be required to obtain the 
instructor's approval to his plans for each succeeding step; 
and as preliminary thereto, the pupil will have read, as fully 
as practicable, the available material shedding light on his 
problem. 

6. During the year in which a pupil is engaged upon a 
project, it is assumed that he will not expect to devote his 
working hours to other ends — such as work on his father's 
farm or preparation for college. The school should coop- 
erate with him in showing him how to spend his non-work- 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 173 

ing hours to best cultural and social advantage, — in general 
reading, music, social games, and the like. 

Obviously, the pupil on a serious project (and no play 
project is contemplated here) can hardly join in the social 
activities of the cultural high school or in the taking of 
regular high school studies. Certainly he cannot take *' A " 
class studies designed as preparatory to college. On the 
other hand, anything the school can now do to accustom the 
prospective farmer to the richer use of leisure (evenings, 
holidays, agricultural " dull " seasons) during the times when 
adult farmers have such leisure will be of the utmost profit. 
Only the traditions of old-fashioned schoolmasters will pre- 
serve the notion that in a vocational school hours from 
the heart of the working day should be taken either for 
school '' sports " on the one hand, or for liberal studies on 
the other. 

7. It is assumed that the program for the pupil will call 
for little special or separate study of physics, chemistry, 
accounting, or even of fertilizers, soils and markets; but 
that when, in the pursuit of a given project, the learner 
encounters problems that can be illumined by brief side ex- 
cursions (readings and a few laboratory tests will usually 
suffice for the needed appreciation and control), these ex- 
cursions should be taken to the extent that the time and 
abilities of the learner permit — which will usually be far 
short of the standards suggested by textbooks, or formal 
school courses in these subjects. (It will be hard, of course, 
for most school men of traditionalistic views to persuade 
themselves that an average boy can gain scientific insight 
of useful degree and character except via the old road, 
dear to schoolmasters, of ''principles" first; but men of 
modern training will ''find a new way.") 

Pedagogical Principles. — What is the vocational peda- 
gogy of aim and method implicit in the foregoing condi- 
tions ? These principles at least : 



174 



Vocational Education 



1. The primary aim in vocational training for farmers is 
to produce the independent planner or manager — the man 
who is disposed, by long and varied habituation and ideal, 
to look ahead, to make provision for the future, to prear- 
range, to *' keep his head running in advance of his feet." 
Secondary aims are technical knowledge and manual skill. 
Unlike many other vocations, farming, as practiced most 
successfully in America, throws a maximum of unspecial- 
ized responsibility on the individual farmer for scientific 
planning. Specialization in most commercial and indus- 
trial pursuits has given responsibility for planning to high- 
grade specialists. 

2. The pedagogical method of the project is to put the 
learner in a position where, by aid of expert advice sought 
when necessary, he must plan and conduct, on an essentially 
commercial basis, at least for one year, one strand or unit 
of a farming occupation. If, in a given region, successful 
farming as a whole involves gardening and poultry raising, 
our young learner, for the sake of successful concentration, 
becomes a poultry man for one year, a gardener the next, 
but, in each case, on a commercial basis to the extent of 
paying for needed hired capital and earning a reasonable 
labor reward for himself. 

3. The essence of successful vocational education as a 
continuing process consists : first, in the acquisition of skill 
and managerial ability in such a way that the learner be- 
comes increasingly capable of estimating his own short- 
comings and correcting them through self-directed efforts; 
and, second, in the increasing power of the learner to utilize 
printed matter as a source of knowledge and direction in 
new emergencies. Nearly every branch of agriculture has 
developed a rich technical literature of its own, to which 
results of research and experimentation are constantly be- 
ing added. The intelligent farmer who has developed 
capacities and powers of utilizing and applying published 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 175 

matter describing advances in his field, is in the best possible 
position to profit from the results of " scientific " or " pro- 
gressive " agriculture. For this reason it is to be expected 
that the boy who has, under the guidance of a teacher, 
worked to successful completion one or more projects, 
wherein he has made extensive use of bulletins and other 
technical reading materials, and, in solving the scientific 
problems connected with these, has done some laboratory 
experiments and has carefully read the interpreting sci- 
entific literature, — it is expected that this boy, as a man, 
confronted by new problems in a field already somewhat 
familiar to him, or by the problems presented in quite a new 
field, will very naturally at once utilize his powers of assem- 
bling and reading scientific materials and applying the results 
to the specific situations confronting him. The flexibility 
of mind and resourcefulness as regards means and methods 
that should result from right use of the project method will 
abundantly justify a considerable investment of money in 
securing persons properly qualified to execute it. 

V 

Rural Schools and Vocational Education for the Farming 
Callings. — The historic rural elementary school has had 
poor equipment, short school years, transient and untrained 
teachers, meager supervision, irregular attendance, and ex- 
cessive numbers of grades. The historic rural high school 
has been understaffed and underequipped while its curricu- 
lum offerings have been excessively formal and quite unre- 
lated to local needs. During the last few years some bril- 
liant experimental w^ork has been done in developing im- 
proved types of rural school organization, and in recon- 
structing courses of study. A wealth of " aspirational " 
literature has also appeared, some of the implicit programs 
of which are probably hopeless, while others may prove 
workable. 



176 Vocational Education 

Actual aims of rural school education beyond the primary 
grades remain as yet largely undefined, except in the vague 
language of undiscriminating generalization. In the as- 
pirational literature referred to it is constantly held that 
" the rural school must fit for country life " ; and it is inces- 
santly urged that " agriculture " must be extensively taught. 
It is often charged that rural school curriculums have been 
unduly influenced by courses, textbooks, and principles of 
method devised for city schools. Recently large hopes have 
been built on the " agricultural high school " as a means of 
vitalizing secondary education. 

It is obvious that the problem of providing vocational 
education will be peculiarly difficult in the country; since, 
ordinarily, vocational education involves so much special- 
ization. Where agricultural conditions are favorable a 
substantial proportion of farm boys become farmers; but 
under the socially dynamic conditions which have prevailed 
in America for the last century (and which will probably 
prevail for the next century) anywhere from thirty to 
seventy per cent of farm boys have eventually followed other 
vocations than farming — the professions, mercantile life, 
transportation, and, to some extent, industrial pursuits. 
Now that public policy contemplates making opportunities 
for vocational education in schools available for every one, 
the problem of providing such opportunities for country 
children must be faced. If the mountain will not come to 
Mahomet, the prophet must go to the mountain. We are 
here faced with the old problem of the advantages of 
country life versus those of city life. 

Compared with the city community, the country commu- 
nity has certain advantages, and also certain disadvantages. 
City dwellers find access to stores, churches, schools, and 
theaters easy ; their mail comes more frequently, their news- 
papers earlier; by night their ways of travel are better 
lighted; and means of speedy travel are more available. 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 177 

But the country dweller has more air, more sunshine, 
more quiet, and more varied points of contact with nature 
than his city brother. Most thoughtful people agree that 
it would be better, on the whole, if all children could be 
reared, at least to sixteen years of age, in a country com- 
munity or in a clean, small village (many small villages are 
less clean than large cities), where the agricultural occupa- 
tions predominate. 

Life in cities makes urgent and necessary certain forms of 
cooperative effort, which, when realized, add decidedly to 
the attractiveness of city life. Drainage, water, streets 
and walks, lighting, policing, fire protection, free delivery of 
goods — these, cooperatively provided in the city, must in 
the country be procured chiefly through individual effort. 
But the country should in return enable a man of given 
ability to support himself and to build up a competence more 
certainly and easily than in the city. 

We are learning that cooperative effort on a much more 
extended scale than now practiced is possible and desirable 
in country communities. In literally hundreds of directions 
the opportunities for this are being discovered and defined. 
But, unfortunately, the country community often does not 
develop men and women who have powers of invention and 
initiative adequate to meet local needs for varied coopera- 
tion. 

Where one hundred thousand persons are gathered to- 
gether in one compact community there are sure to be 
among these a half-dozen persons who combine great abil- 
ity and great interest in some one phase of cooperative 
activity. Thus parks, schools, art museums, streets, monu- 
ments, theaters, lighting, drainage, water supply, social 
centers, free hospitals, charities, boys' clubs, and the scores 
of other joint enterprises of the city have each their little 
group of partisans, supporters, experts. 

Such specialized service and interest are hardly practi- 

N 



178 Vocational Education 

cable in the country except over areas too vast for easy inter- 
communication. New devices must be employed. Action 
by the state, or by large cooperative organizations like the 
Grange, may be necessary. The country must gradually, by 
its demands, call into existence and build up special agencies 
like the Extension Service of the Agricultural Colleges, 
Packing Associations and County Agent work. 

The country is necessarily always at certain disadvan- 
tages in organizing and providing schools. Less special- 
izing of teaching service and supervision, less grading in 
homogeneous groups, and fewer varieties of educational 
offerings — these limitations are inevitable. Probably when 
we shall have learned more of the values of the by-education 
that accrue from few rather than many associates, life in the 
open, and early beginnings of normal physical work we shall 
realize that the country offers large offsetting advantages ; 
but as to these things we yet possess only faiths, verified by 
but little knowledge. 

Country youths will, therefore, have to go to urban centers 
for education for most vocations other than farming. At any 
rate they will have to go from home. In time it may prove 
sound public policy for the state to meet the expenses of travel 
and residence away from home on the part of those who in 
good faith seek preparation for vocations other than farming. 

To what extent can the farming vocations be taught to 
youths and adults while living at home? This question 
brings into relief a series of problems regarding the aims of 
all education in and for rural communities. The following 
findings are submitted as contributions to a discussion by no 
means yet finished. 

1. The Aims of Rural Scliool Elementary Education 
should not be fundamentally different, nor, as aims are 
commonly stated, at all different for country, as against city, 
children. It is desirable that country children should learn 
to read, write, and spell no less and no differently than city 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 179 

children. Country children should learn something about 
American history and world history no less than correspond- 
ing grades of city dwellers. The geography of Asia, Africa, 
Europe should be learned to the same ends, to the same ex- 
tent, and probably, in the main, by the same methods by 
country as by city children. Music, literature, hygiene, good 
English expression, science and practical arts should be 
studied in the country to substantially the same ends as the 
subjects should be studied in the city. 

The methods of rural education, it may well be contended, 
should, in the case of country children, differ from those for 
city children; but for purposes of adequate analysis this 
simple differentiation is too crude. The aims in teaching 
the geography of Asia to country children will be the same 
as for city children, as stated above; but in teaching the 
geography of Asia, the efficient teacher will use to the ut- 
most, as apperceiving knowledge, everything practicable in 
the environment of the children — narrow streets and 
crowded city blocks in some schools, desert wastes in others, 
and fertile river bottoms in still others, according to local 
conditions. Hence not only will the methods used in teach- 
ing the geography of Asia differ as between good country 
and good urban schools ; they will differ no less as between 
a country school in Southern Illinois and a country school 
in the dry lands of Utah, or as between a city school in San 
Francisco and a city school in Rochester. 

We certainly expect, in all good elementary schools, to 
have nature studied; and sound aims for this subject will 
be the same for all kinds of schools dealing with children of 
like ages. But nature study must seek, as its central pur- 
pose, to render appreciable and intelligible the natural en- 
vironment of the child — the environment of stars, moun- 
tains, and valleys, water courses, plants, animals, and har- 
nessed natural forces. But the natural environment of the 
child on Cape Cod in winter differs very greatly from the 



i8o Vocational Education 

natural environment of a child in Southern California 
springtime, both in town and country. The natural envi- 
ronment of a child in a mining town of Northern Minnesota 
differs greatly from that of a child in the East Side of New 
York. Hence the methods and means of teaching nature 
study will differ greatly between one city and another city, 
and hardly less between one rural school and another. 

Obviously the same conditions differentiate the methods 
of teaching hygiene. The essential aims in this subject 
may be expected to be the same wherever good teaching 
prevails. But specific objectives of attack and utihzation of 
local conditions will differ greatly, as between different 
cities or different rural communities no less than as be- 
tween rural community and urban. The importance of 
pure water is the same everywhere; but the means of con- 
trolling its purity will of course be taught to children along 
lines of local conditions, varying from those found in New 
York City with its superb supply of pure mountain water to 
St. Louis with its system of filtered river water; from a 
foothill home in New York with a splendid spring to a home 
in flat lowlands where shallow wells furnish the only supply 
available. 

2. Rural Secondary Education Will the aims of rural 

secondary education differ from those of the city? Sec- 
ondary education now includes two very distinct species — 
namely, general and vocational. General education includes 
the cultural, civic, and physical. Let us consider general 
education first. On the plane of general secondary edu- 
cation (for normal children 12-18 years of age) the first 
fundamental aim is to secure common powers and appre- 
ciations in those matters that are essential to social solidar- 
ity. In part, these ends are realized through the by-education 
of association and participation in common activities made 
possible in town and country alike by school attendance. 
In part, they are realized through such studies as assure 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings i8i 

common standards of cultural and civic habits, apprecia- 
tions, aspirations, ideals, and insights — along such lines as 
speech, manners, hygiene, criteria of moral behavior, under- 
standing of social environment, comprehension of structures 
and functions of government, appreciations of social forces 
operative throughout the world. In part, also, the ends of gen- 
eral education are to be realized through cultivation of indi- 
vidual interests and talents towards cultural and civic leader- 
ship — in music, plastic art, foreign language, science, 
craftsmanship and the like. What should be the weightings 
of time and energy given respectively to these two types of 
requirements in secondary education we do not yet know 
because we are still deficient in reliable sociological standards 
of educational aim. 

Is it at all probable that the aims of general secondary 
education will differ greatly as between city and country? 
In what respects ? And for what reasons ? A few surmises 
may safely be hazarded. Probably literature should be 
made more of in country than in city schools for the reason 
that the country dweller's life shuts him away in large 
measure from the means of congregate use of leisure — 
theaters, lectures, museums, clubs, etc. Perhaps we need 
give less attention to the physical training of rural than of 
urban boys because of the more favorable physical environ- 
ment of the former. 

In every case, of course, local conditions will be utilized 
as far as practicable as means and methods of realizing aims, 
whether these aims be identical or different in the case of 
rural and urban dwellers. Community civics in the city will 
certainly be taught in terms of city blocks, street-car trans- 
portation, easily accessible markets, omnipresence of com- 
mercial entertainment, commercial drainage and water sup- 
ply, and urgent needs of physical facilities for play. In the 
country the same subjects would be taught in terms of line 
fences, difficulties of congregation, remoteness of markets, 



1 82 Vocational Education 

unavailability of commercial entertainment (except liter- 
ature and mechanical music). 

Biology taught in rural high schools will, we should 
expect, like the nature study of the grades, be interpreted 
largely in terms of local and accessible examples and con- 
ditions, just as should be the case with the subject when 
taught in the city. But conditions for the teaching of biol- 
ogy in rural high schools will differ no less as between the 
dairy regions of the Adirondacks and the swamps of eastern 
Texas than between a " typical " rural, and a " typical " 
urban environment — if experience should show us that 
there are such things as types in these matters. 

3. Agriculture in General Education. — Many high schools 
now offer one or more " agricultural " courses paralleling 
other general courses, such as English literature, foreign lan- 
guage, history and physics. Agricultural and some other 
colleges have been persuaded to grant entrance credit to a 
moderate extent for this work. 

In many cases it has doubtless been the desire and intent 
that these agricultural courses should " function " vocation- 
ally. To some extent laboratory and field experimental 
work supplemental to textbook studies has been developed 
and in a few notable instances really fine cooperative projects 
and individual productive work have been undertaken. Not 
infrequently it has been possible to obtain enthusiastic teach- 
ers from the agricultural colleges. There is available a 
wealth of splendid textbooks on the various phases of agri- 
culture, and supporting the whole are the contemporary 
enthusiasms for better farming, " country life " and '' back 
to the country " movements. 

But it is doubtful if these high school agricultural courses 
function to any important extent in vocational powers. To 
some rare spirits they probably yield a stock of apprecia- 
tions and ideals that may lead later to vocational study or 
practice. At their very best, these schools can offer only 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 183 

" agricultural technical instruction " — a very valuable con- 
tribution to vocational powers when taken strictly under the 
conditions of extension education, but of very doubtful 
worth, except for a possible two or three per cent of " ab- 
stract " minded students, as a substitute for basic vocational 
education. 

But these courses are, or can easily be made, valuable 
factors in general or, more expressively, liberal education. 
By any adequate definition, the aims of liberal education 
should include the development of a large variety of appre- 
ciations, aspirations, ideals, and sympathetic insights relative 
to the material and social environment of the learner. Any 
one of the many excellent textbooks on agriculture now 
available, taught to interested pupils by an enthusiastic 
teacher, following '' beta " methods, will certainly yield rich 
fruit of culture and civic insights. 

The writer has now before him such a book. It goes in 
detail into the wonderful modern developments of seed corn 
testing. It has an illuminating chapter on wheat. Alfalfa, 
irrigation, vegetable gardening, breeding of poultry, classes 
and grades of horses, erosion of soils, and scores of other 
alluring topics (to the healthily curious mind that likes that 
sort of thing) are treated with abundance of illustration and 
simplicity of language. Probably the book was designed to 
help train boys to become " general farmers " in the Middle 
West. Certainly it has no message for prospective produc- 
ers of tobacco, grapefruit, cotton, cranberries, greenhouse 
products, oranges, bees, clams, hares, or range cattle. On 
the other hand its range is clearly too vast for any one 
individual seeking to become a proficient producer of one 
major and two minor *^ money making " crops, even in the 
Middle AVest. Perhaps it was designed to serve, like a dic- 
tionary or encyclopedia, as a reference work, each learner 
abstracting the things he most needs ; but has any one found 
a book so used in high school agricultural courses ? 



184 Vocational Education 

But with proper methods of treatment the book could be 
used to excellent advantage as the basis of a " liberalizing " 
course in agriculture. Suppose it included topics not now 
included — on cotton growing, orange production, and white 
pine ''cultivated" forests; suppose it discussed the rich 
possibilities of clam farming, vegetable drying, the total 
extermination of certain pests; suppose it took us over the 
world to see coffee, rubber, and tea plantations as well as 
Chinese gardening, Stassfurth potash mining, nitrogen fix- 
ation in Norway, and swamp-clearing in Florida; suppose 
finally, it helped initiate us in an understanding of modern 
farm machinery, agricultural science, world markets and the 
territorial specialization of agriculture — would not all this 
be " liberal " education — and for city boys no less than 
those destined to remain in the country? 

It may be doubted, indeed, whether agricultural courses 
as now organized and administered do actually realize these 
ends of liberal education. For one thing their objectives are 
not well defined. The teachers are usually striving, probably 
with futile efforts, to produce vocational powers. They 
therefore require just the kind of memorization, passing of 
tests, and attention to detail that kills the spirit of truly 
''liberating" education. They grind, drive, examine, and 
" flunk." The subject becomes neither the fish of voca- 
tional education nor the fowl of liberal education — and 
therefore it now tends to become the red herring of "col- 
lege preparatory work " for pupils who are not good enough 
for the classics. When once the colleges — agricultural or 
other — begin to enforce prescriptions as to what shall be 
the " content "of high school agriculture then indeed the 
subject will be hopeless as material for good secondary 
education. 

But we ought to save it. Let our junior high school make 
much of home gardening — always utilizing to the maxi- 
mum the amateur spirit. Let our high schools offer short 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 185 

courses — none exceeding one hundred hours — in " Agri- 
cultural Science," '' American Agriculture," '' World Agri- 
culture," and '' Amateur Gardening " which shall be inspi- 
rational, vision-giving, enthusiasm stirring. These courses 
will not prepare people to succeed in any one of the hundreds 
of possible agricultural vocations; but they may guide some 
choice spirits towards farming, and, of equal importance, 
warn some unsuited persons away; they will surely serve to 
indicate to prospective farmers the great desirability of 
definite vocational training therefor, and the best means of 
obtaining it; and they will give to nearly all some vision, 
some finer aspirations, some ideals which will function in 
personal culture and good citizenship. 

4. Vocational Secondary Education for the country will, 
however, differ greatly from that for the city, will it not? 
Does this question mean the opportunities that will be pro- 
vided for country boys, or does it mean the types of vo- 
cational schools that should properly be placed in a country 
environment? If the former, not at all; if the latter, the 
reply is, certainly. 

Country-reared boys may be expected to scatter into a 
great many vocations. Some become respectively doctors, 
lawyers, teachers, engineers, ministers. Many enter upon 
commercial pursuits. They move in large numbers to in- 
dustrial centers and enter upon trade and factory callings. 
But vocational schools for any of these various callings are 
likely to be located in transportation and population centers. 
Thither country boys, village boys, and city boys will move 
for vocational education. 

On the other hand the city is no place for a good school 
of agriculture any more than it is a good place for a school 
of mining, navigation, astronomical research, or forestry. 
Hence both country boys and city boys, seeking good voca- 
tional schools in these lines, will have to go to places suitable 
for the conduct of such schools. 



1 86 Vocational Education 

Of course, relatively few city boys may be expected to seek 
admission to the farming vocations ; and, vice versa, a rela- 
tively large proportion of country boys ought, conditions 
being normal, to aspire to farming callings ; but these facts 
must be further analyzed before we can say with easy assur- 
ance that " country children require a different education 
from city children." 

Of the many semi-illusions found in current aspirational 
writing relative to rural education none is more deceptive 
than that cherished under the ideal of the " agricultural high 
school." Those who believe in the practicability of a 
" blend " of liberal and vocational education see in the agri- 
cultural high school an institution which will be increasingly 
attended by all country children between 14 (perhaps 12) 
and 18 years of age, and in which the objectives of liberal 
and vocational education will be pursued almost, if not 
quite, simultaneously, the one lending motive and inspira- 
tion to the other. This vision further requires that at the 
end of the twelfth grade all graduates will receive the same 
diploma and that colleges will give credit towards admission 
to units of agricultural work on a par with other subjects. 

No one will dispute the practicability of offering in rural 
high schools very good academic courses in agriculture par- 
allel with courses in foreign language, history, English lan- 
guage, science, and mathematics. Excellent textbooks and 
manuals of guidance for laboratory and even field work are 
abundantly available. Graduates of agricultural colleges 
are usually fully as well equipped to present agricultural 
instruction as are graduates of other colleges to present 
French, chemistry or modern history. For many students, 
certainly, the work so offered will prove no less " liberaliz- 
ing," " culture giving," and '* disciplinary " than algebra, 
physics, or Latin. 

But, considering the ages, the antecedent and parallel 
experiences, and the probable motives of the students, will 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 187 

it prove effective as vocational education? The man of aca- 
demic prepossessions will probably reply " yes." So also will 
the layman w^ho thinks uncritically, and whose imagination 
is carried away by the mysteries of test tubes and the sug- 
gestiveness of well-illustrated textbooks. What will the 
critical investigator say who seeks to measure results in 
vocational education by starting with the ascertained re- 
quirements — in terms of the particular manipulative skills, 
concretely described general and detailed knowledge, definite 
managerial powers, and functioning ideals — of a desig- 
nated type of farmer's calling? Will it appear to him 
probable that vocational powers genuinely worth while can 
derive from " studies " predominantly academic, pursued as 
basic vocational education by students of the usual high 
school type? It remains doubtful indeed in spite of the 
alleged success of some experiments " carried " by the en- 
thusiasm of some rare genius in modern education. 

To the writer it seems strongly probable, as stated else- 
where, that as experience accumulates and is subjected to 
accurate testing it will be found that effective vocational 
education is to be accomplished only under conditions of 
concentration analogous to those required of workers en- 
gaging definitely in full time productive work. If a boy 
has 1500 or 1800 hours available for purposes of vocational 
education in a farming calling or one strongly marked 
strand of a farming calling, it is probable that many times 
as much power will be gained by concentrating them within 
one year of strictly vocational work at the rate of five or 
six hours daily for 300 days (or 365 days in the case of Hve 
stock projects) rather than at the rate of two hours a day 
for 200 days during four years while giving needed atten- 
tion to parallel studies so engrossing as foreign language, 
mathematics, and history. 

If these contentions are correct how may we expect to 
find basic vocational education for the farming callings 



1 88 Vocational Education 

organized in the future? For boys from fifteen to nineteen 
years of age, resident on farms, the " home projects 
method " will undoubtedly prevail. Where twelve to twenty 
boys can be found ready each to give a year to definite 
training, a school can easily be organized. Practically all 
that is required is a live and practical teacher, a central 
meeting room, a good collection of agricultural reference 
reading, and " project outlines " for each student. 

Under the direction of the teacher each boy plans, pref- 
erably in the autumn, for his project. To be an effective 
means of education in managerial responsibility it must be 
of good size — preferably netting the boy at least $100 for 
his year's work, and claiming, for actual performance and 
related study, not less than 1000 to 1500 hours in the year. 
Of course, the boy is expected to rent land, hire equipment 
and excess labor, and buy seed and fertilizer, under the direc- 
tion of the teacher, as a part of the management of the 
enterprise. 

The local high school when it can offer room for the 
center for such a school is doubtless the best and most log- 
ical place for its location. But the vocational school should 
not, ordinarily, come under the direction of the high school 
principal any more than a law school in a university should 
come under the direction of the dean of the college of liberal 
arts. The farm school will, of course, like all other public 
schools of the area, come under the general oversight of 
the superintendent of schools whose functions will be chiefly 
administrative rather than supervisory and whose position 
is analogous to that of the university president. 

There are many reasons why the farming school and the 
high school of liberal education should be very distinctive 
in local management. The aims of the two schools are 
fundamentally unlike. Their time schedules must in many 
cases be also fundamentally unlike. Live stock projects 
often permit a fairly uniform assignment of time through- 



Vocational Education for the Agricultural Callings 189 

out the year; but tillage projects make very irregular de- 
mands, as affected by weather conditions. In the northern 
states tillage projects make small demands during winter 
months while they make very large demands for labor dur- 
ing planting, early growing, and harvesting seasons. 

Can or should the vocational student take any " liberal " 
studies? Obviously if high school programs could be 
arranged on a " quarter " or other " short term " basis 
arrangements could doubtless be effected. Historically, the 
" grammar " school and academy were often attended dur- 
ing the winter months only by ''big" boys and even young 
men. Some "technical" schools of agriculture are even 
yet attended chiefly by young men able to " lay off " during 
the farmer's dull time. Certainly some accommodations 
could be effected for boys required to give not more than 
three or four hours per day in winter to tillage projects and 
the related subprojects, technical studies, and general agri- 
cultural studies. But, ordinarily, to assume that a boy 
seriously engaged in tillage, fruit, pig, or poultry projects 
(an exception may be found in dairy projects) can give 
scheduled time throughout the usual school year to non- 
agricultural studies within the customary working day is 
to persist in a form of thinking which certainly points to 
dilettantism and trifling with vocational education — a 
course destined often to produce just the unsubstantial kind 
of farmer that modern society wants to avoid. 



CHAPTER VI 

COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

Widespread Development. — Commercial education in 
schools, whether effective or not in giving actual preparation 
for the numerous commercial vocations, has been for many 
years much the most widely developed form of so-called vo- 
cational education in either private or public schools. It is 
a safe estimate that in 1918 over half a million boys and girls 
were pursuing " commercial " courses in schools in the 
United States. 

The evolution of commercial education is sociologically 
very interesting. Attending the enormous expansion of 
business that followed the Civil War was the development of 
private " business colleges " which at first flourished largely 
on the teaching of business penmanship, bookkeeping, and re- 
lated academic subjects. Later they added stenography and 
typewriting. They competed severely with the regular high 
schools, and were, naturally, accused of '' exploiting " their 
pupils. Certainly they proved, in many cases, great sources 
of revenue to clever advertisers. Employers of clerical 
workers finally formed the habit of turning to these schools 
for young assistants or minor specialists. Hence, quite 
apart from their educational functions, they served as means 
of selection and as employment agencies for young people 
ambitious and more or less qualified to begin work in some 
commercial vocation. In some respects they resembled 
what, in a few industrial vocations, are to-day called " pre- 
apprenticeship " schools. 

Finally the public schools began the development of 

igo 



Commercial Education 191 

" commercial " courses. The rivalry of the fee-charging 
private schools was, of course, always provocative, and was 
an especial source of grievance to poor parents who de- 
sired full opportunities for " free " practical education for 
their children. The high schools, too, were being attended 
by increasing numbers of children not qualified by interest 
or ability to carry the college preparatory studies. Com- 
mercial courses, especially if " short " and of not too ex- 
acting standards, were peculiarly suited to these intellec- 
tual " weaklings," as they were often regarded. Of con- 
siderable importance, too, was the fact that commercial 
courses were not expensive. As commonly organized 
and administered they cost no more per capita than the 
regular academic courses. Even yet special training 
courses for commercial teachers have been only very 
meagerly developed. Except in stenography and type- 
writing, commercial teachers frequently represent no special 
equipment whatever. 

The Popularity of Commercial Education. — Though com- 
mercial education has long been much the most widely de- 
veloped form of so-called vocational education now found 
in schools, its actual contributions to various forms of voca- 
tional proficiency are by no means clear even yet. Why 
then has it been so widely patronized and supported ? Why, 
especially, do the sons, and in even greater numbers, the 
daughters of farmers, laborers, and other persons in mod- 
erate circumstances throng public and private commercial 
schools and departments, including the thousands of 
meagerly staffed ones found in rural and village commu- 
nities ? 

Several social conditions must be examined in order to 
discover explanations of these phenomena: (a) The com- 
mercial vocations are generally esteemed as being more 
profitable and respectable than the pursuits of the farmer 
and trade worker, to say nothing of those of the domestic 



192 Vocational Education 

servant and the factory operative. During recent decades 
particularly, and accompanying the enormous developments 
of transportation, commerce, and the clerical sides of manu- 
facturing, publishing, and public service, not only has the 
proportion of workers engaged in the commercial callings 
greatly multiplied, but it is evident that in these fields, too, 
are to be found some rewards much greater than come to 
men in other fields. The really alluring business prizes 
are not now found in the professional callings, but in work 
somehow related to commerce, — trade, transportation, 
banking, company flotation, etc. 

Furthermore, the commercial callings are essentially ur- 
ban vocations; and they seem to be well removed from the 
grimy surroundings of the factory occupations. These 
factors play a large part in the choice of vocations by young 
persons. It must not be overlooked that in America, to an 
extent not heretofore found in history, probably, sons and 
daughters are expected by their elders to enter upon voca- 
tions superior to those followed by their parents — supe- 
rior in popular valuation at least. 

(b) It is also a fact that apprenticeship has existed in 
organized form for very few of the commercial calhngs. 
Hence any agency claiming to give vocational preparation 
for these vocations could easily persuade young aspirants 
that only through the help of these schools could access to 
the desired work be procured. This condition has been 
favored by what has been to the outside world the rela- 
tively esoteric character of the commercial arts of book- 
keeping, stenography, and, in earlier years, commercial 
arithmetic. 

(c) The commercial world has opened up an enormous 
number of places for w^omen, or more properly, girl, work- 
ers. (In popular fiction and probably to an increasing ex- 
tent in popular usage generally, the unmarried, but as yet 
distinctly marriageable, woman is a "girl.") But the 



Commercial Education 193 

large majority of these serve only from three to six years 
as wage-earners, after which they marry. Hence the '' turn- 
over " or " replacement "of these workers is very large and 
creates a perennial demand for armies of new recruits. 

(d) Another factor in the popularity of commercial 
courses is found in the ease with which the appearances of 
vocational education can be simulated for business callings. 
In the earlier days of these schools, a man with a moderate 
knowledge of theoretical bookkeeping and some skill in 
bookkeeper's penmanship could, if he were clever advertiser, 
easily obtain a large clientage. When typewriting and 
stenography evolved as adjuncts in all business, it was easy 
to provide for the teaching of these arts in schoolrooms 
and with only slightly modified school equipment. 

(e) The development of commercial courses in high 
schools has given large opportunities to provide for students 
not able to meet the standards of the regular courses. At 
least in their earlier years high school commercial courses, 
having no genuine vocational standards, were simply mod- 
ified *' general " courses, but designed to appeal more or less 
to vocational motives. By many teachers these courses were 
called " dumping grounds of mediocrity." School author- 
ities saw, in the large attendance they stimulated, proof that 
the schools were now meeting the '' needs of the people." 
A very large proportion of the pupils attending went, before 
or after graduation, into clerical or other form of commer- 
cial work, even though their compensation must long remain 
substantially that of untrained workers. 

To a large extent, therefore, the extensive development 
and the seeming popularity of commercial education have 
not rested on substantial grounds of bona fide vocational 
education. The statement of this fact does not necessarily 
imply reproach to educators except to that comparatively 
small number of persons who as private school directors or 
public school administrators willfully exploited the credulity 



194 Vocational Education 

of the public. It has been characteristic of nearly all forms 
of vocational education, including those for the professions, 
that for long periods they have been administered quite with- 
out reference to external needs or effective internal methods. 
At times this has been hardly less true of apprenticeship than 
of vocational education in schools. 

But criticisms of past efforts must be made and under- 
stood, if improvements in the future are to be effected in 
accordance with sound principles. It is certainly true that 
the commercial schools of to-day still fall short either of 
sound conceptions of aim or effective adjustments of means 
and methods. It is submitted that the curriculums of a 
substantial majority of the large public coeducational com- 
mercial schools or commercial departments in the United 
States will be found justly open to the criticisms, favorable 
and unfavorable, suggested below. 

Criticisms of Existing Schools. — Let us take the curricu- 
lums of some well-known commercial school and apply to 
them the tests implied in these questions : (a) For what dis- 
tinctive vocations do they prepare ? (b) How are the stand- 
ard requirements for these vocations ascertained? (c) How 
are the component elements of the curriculums derived? (d) 
How are adjustments made for different groups of pupils ? 
(e) How are proximate and ultimate results of work 
tested ? 

(a) Examination of commercial courses and of books 
and articles designed to expound their underlying principles 
will, it is believed, generally convince the candid critic that, 
with very rare exceptions, public school courses are not based 
upon objective analysis of the requirements of vocational 
life. Rarely are distinctive vocations named, or their re- 
quirements defined. Usually it is implied, if not specifically 
stated, " that secondary commercial education consists of 
that training, direct and related, which has as its aim to equip 
young people for entrance into business life." 



Commercial Education 195 

But in any workable sense, there is no such thing as 
" business Hfe." The term is too abstract, even metaphys- 
ical, for the practical purposes of making programs of 
vocational education. Would it be serviceable to speak of 
education for ''professional Hfe"? Or for ''industrial 
life"? We should at once be confronted by the impatient 
question, " What profession in particular are you talking 
about? What trade, or mining, or factory specialty? " 

The president of a city bank, a traveling salesman for 
cigars, a stockbroker, an expert in advertising, an eight 
dollar a week typist, a hotel clerk, a cash girl, an expert, 
accountant, a department store clerk selling children's shoes, 
and a bank clerk operating a comptometer, are all in "busi- 
ness " life; is there any single factor in commercial school 
education that is " common " to the needs of these various 
persons in business life, it being assumed that their general 
schools will have given them the essentials of reading, writ- 
ing and arithmetic? What are the limits of this " business 
life"? Are telephone switchboard operators, telegraphers, 
grocers' delivery boys, fruit commission merchants, editors, 
hotel managers, division superintendents on railroads, trav- 
eling drug salesmen, dental assistants, architects, clerks, all 
in " business life "? 

The fundamental fact, of course, is that there are scores, 
if not hundreds of distinctive commercial vocations; and 
many of these may, as regards needed qualifications, re- 
semble each other in no single respect. There are commer- 
cial callings that are no less professions in the fundamental, 
though of course not in the historic, sense of the term, than 
are the various forms of engineering; and there are num- 
berless other commercial callings which are well adapted to 
juvenile workers sixteen years of age and of only average 
ability. There are commercial callings that require excep- 
tional native power and training in certain phases of mathe- 
matics; and others that require no mathetnatical powers 



196 Vocational Education 

whatever. Some require such highly speciaHzed techniques, 
as stenography, corporation law, commercial Spanish, or 
cost accounting ; while in others these things are never heard 
of. A knowledge of commercial geography will, perhaps, 
function consciously and directly in the life work of one 
person in a thousand among the millions engaged in " busi- 
ness life " ; it will function more or less remotely and inci- 
dentally in the work of one in fifty; while to forty-nine in 
fifty it will have no more vocational significance than the 
history of 17th century Ukrainia. 

In practically all commercial school programs we find 
" business English " or some similar subject taken very 
seriously. But what is "business English"? Clearly a 
good stenographer must possess unusual powers in spelling 
and punctuation ; to what extent as a vocational asset beyond 
the requirements of cultivated life in general does she need 
a trained voice? The department store clerk must receive 
special training in the writing of figures, proper names, etc. ; 
is it urgent that she be taught the accurate spelling of " ten 
thousand or more common words, with especial reference 
to the stenographer's eight hundred * demons ' " ? Tele- 
phone companies, in default of public school training of 
switchboard operators, give painstaking voice drill to these 
operatives; but have these business workers any special 
vocational needs for composition or business letter writing? 
Or is it at all important that similar voice drill be given to 
bookkeepers or cash girls? 

The same indeterminateness characterizes commercial 
school mathematics. Until recently few commercial de- 
partments had the courage to omit algebra. Held there 
only by forces of tradition of course, its presence has often 
been defended on vocational grounds ! But what of " busi- 
ness arithmetic " ? What of the special forms of accuracy 
and speed sought in addition, or the special forms of arith- 
metical content knowledge sought in percentage? For 



Commercial Education 197 

what vocations, and to what extent in each, are they voca- 
tionally essential ? We have as yet no accurate knowledge ; 
and, unfortunately, few promoters of commercial education 
exhibit active desires to get accurate knowledge. 

Stenography constitutes an interesting example of ill-de- 
fined aims. The vocation of stenographer-typist is the one 
distinctive calling for which the prevailing commercial 
school gives functional training. But it has long been 
clearly destined to be a girl's vocation. It is clearly suited 
to girls and its few promotional openings are well adapted 
to the powers of the small proportion of women who remain 
permanently in salary-earning work. Nevertheless, for 
many years our commercial schools have induced, or at least 
approved, the taking of stenography by boys. The author- 
ities have talked vaguely about " court stenography " to 
which women have apparently not yet adapted themselves, 
and about the need of traveling stenographers to accom- 
pany business men. But is it known how extensive are 
these fields ? Again, it has been held, vaguely at best, that 
stenography is a " good stepping stone " for a young man. 
Much trading has been done on the names of a few note- 
worthy examples of men who have risen high above their 
stenographic stepping stones; and, of course, no one ques- 
tions but that a large proportion of the men who have be- 
come salesmen, business executives and the like, once stud- 
ied, even if they did not, for a wage, practice, stenography. 
But was such training necessary, or even important, voca- 
tional preparation for their subsequent calhngs, in contrast 
with what might have been accomplished under more in- 
telligently planned courses ? 

A further evidence of the unscientific character of com- 
mercial courses as usually provided, is found in the length 
of time assigned to them. The Chinese priest, being asked 
why pagodas always had fourteen stages, rephed — "Pa- 
godas must have fourteen stages." Why should high 



198 Vocational Education 

school courses be four years in length? Why not three or 
two years? Is a vocational course of six months in length 
conceivable for some vocation — e.g. that of cash girl, 
file clerk, or seller of ribbons? But, with the coming of 
the junior high school, we are threatened with five year 
courses. They are a '' blend " of the cultural, the civic, 
and the vocational. The keen, well-endowed, well-sup- 
ported boys and girls who '* live through " these courses will 
probably succeed in whatever vocations they undertake, as 
have such well-selected and relatively mature persons at all 
times in the past. But what of the majority who drop by 
the wayside, forced out by pressing economic needs, or drop- 
ping out discouraged by lack of ability ? 

There are some commercial vocations for which persons 
under thirty years of age are practically never accepted; 
and a far greater number for which the age of sixteen is 
sufficient. Probably stenography has evolved to the point 
where no one not possessed of " good " native ability, the 
equivalent of a general education of two years beyond the 
elementary school, and of substantially twenty-four hun- 
dred hours' specific vocational training should be advised to 
compete. But would it not be absurd to set up similar re- 
quirements for a department of indoor salesmanship? On 
the other hand would not similar requirements be quite in- 
adequate for the vocationally trained " bookkeeper " or, 
perhaps more accurately, accountant? 

It is needless here to discuss the failure, as yet, of most 
commercial schools, to utilize " productive " work as a 
means of giving the practical experience essential to the 
vocational success of those who will not be expected to 
serve a long apprenticeship on leaving the school. The pos- 
sibilities of " part-time " connections as means of educa- 
tion for indoor salesmanship are now being seen. 

In general, then, it is contended that commercial educa- 
tion is, as yet, vocational in any accurate sense for only a 



Commercial Education 199 

small proportion of those who take it; and that it can be 
rendered properly vocational only as a result of thorough- 
going analysis of the scores of commercial vocations for 
which training is practicable. 

Constructive Proposals. — Obviously all constructive pro- 
posals for the further development of the various types of 
commercial education must depend upon sociological analy- 
sis of the commercial vocations as now carried on or as they 
may be expected to be carried on in the near future. On the 
basis of such examination can be determined, first, the rela- 
tive efficacy of the non-school vocational education which 
has heretofore operated; and, second, the practicability and 
conditions of school vocational education, either basic or 
extension. 

One of the first problems to be solved will be that of ac- 
curately descriptive terminology. The census, for example, 
gives us the category '' clerks in stores." Is this blanket 
term at all helpful? Is it at all practicable to give instruc- 
tion or training to help persons to become '' clerks in stores." 
Ten minutes' walk down the business street of any city will 
enable us to see working clerks in: soda water fountains; 
shoe stores; grocery stores; lumber and coal yards; depart- 
ment store glove counters; hardware stores; and stores for 
men's clothing. What are their common forms of voca- 
tional knowledge, skill, or ideal? Would not all attempts 
to give general commercial training to youths who might 
embark in these callings practically resolve themselves into 
solemn talks about salesmanship, supplemented by a few 
bits of specific training in the making of figures, use of 
cash registers, etc. ? 

Suppose, however, we had 100 boys of sixteen, all of 
whom were as desirous and certain of becoming grocers' 
clerks in small cities as dental students are of becoming 
practicing dentists; could we not readily devise means to 
provide at least two years of rich vocational education for 



200 Vocational Education 

them, on a half-time participation basis, probably on a wage 
of ten to fifteen cents per hour for 30 hours per week? 

In other words it seems probable that we shall have to 
define " store clerk " vocations more specifically than we 
have heretofore done, as a basis for working programs. 
One inevitable consequence^-of this will be the differentiation 
of schools according to communities. Not every town could 
expect to have schools respectively for hardware clerks, drug 
store clerks (some of whom are, of course, now trained — 
but not for salesmanship — in schools of pharmacy), shoe 
store clerks and green grocer's clerks. But within a group 
of neighboring towns could readily be provided one of each 
of these forms of schools. 

No less difficulty is presented by the use in educational 
institutions of the word "' secretary " as descriptive of the 
follower of a vocational pursuit. Who is a " secretary " ? 
What are secretarial studies? At what age does a person 
become a secretary ? Are stenography and typewriting pri- 
mary or secondary accomplishments in the equipment of the 
young low-priced secretary or the young high-priced secre- 
tary or the mature, high-priced executive secretary? Do 
men and women secretaries usually occupy similar, or very 
markedly dififerentiated, fields? Is not the secretarial posi- 
tion, in any strict use of the term, usually a '' derivative" or 
" promotional " position, akin to that of foreman or business 
manager? If so, may not *' post-experience," graduate, 
" upgrading," or extension education be the most effective 
means of education for secretaryship? But if a woman de- 
sires to complete half or all of a general college course be- 
fore beginning vocational training, and then, because she 
desires in the shortest possible space to become a responsible 
and well-paid secretary — for what program of study, prac- 
tice, and preliminary employments should she provide? 
Would it make any difference whether she is to be secretary 
in a publishing house, a wholesale produce establishment, or 
the offices of a railway corporation? 



Com?nercial Education 2pi 

Towards the making of secretaries, executives, and the 
Hke we have probably overestimated the possibihties of in- 
itial vocational education for beginners, and underesti- 
mated the possibilities of upgrading or " post-experience " 
education for selected persons of maturity. Under present 
conditions perhaps all good secretaries should first have 
" made good " as stenographers, after which six months or 
one year of special training would accomplish more prob- 
ably than several years of technical instruction adminis- 
tered to the novice. 

Another group of vocations for which we shall certainly 
ere long provide vocational education will be that of " trav- 
eling (or field) salesmanship." It seems probable that in- 
door or counter salesmanship will soon be monopolized by 
women or girls. But field salesmanship may long remain 
essentially a man's calling. 

Many wholesaling and jobbing establishments as well as 
insurance companies, bond houses, etc., now give their own 
salesmen a certain amount of technical instruction and 
training subsequent to a period of apprenticeship in the home 
office. Such local training is obviously very direct and con- 
crete. 

But again we are confronted by problems of '' general " 
vocational education. Certain high schools of commerce 
now expect a large proportion of their graduates to become 
field salesmen — of what? They do not know, specifically, 
so they give them a variety of technical subjects — one or 
more foreign languages, economics, biology, history of com- 
merce, accounting, stenography, chemistry, commercial law. 
Does all this constitute vocational education — or is it 
merely an attempt at general technical instruction in antici- 
pation of vocational education (out of school, probably) to 
be undertaken when once a job has been found? 

The future here also probably lies with much more spe- 
cific training towards definitely selected vocations, adminis- 



202 Vocational Education 

tered to students who, in many cases, will probably be re- 
quired to have obtained in advance not only a reasonable 
general education, but also one or more years of practical 
experience in a contributory but essential field. It may 
prove inadvisable to send a man out as seller of automobiles, 
woolen cloth, or textbooks until, precedent to specific train- 
ing for that work, he shall have served as an operative in 
the automobile factory, an inspector of the woolen goods, or 
a teacher in the schools. 

Finally, it can hardly be doubted that for many types of 
commercial workers the tendency towards specialization of 
function, and therefore, of training, at least in initial stages, 
for it must continue. In many cases we yet require aspir- 
ants for the stenographer's vocation to take bookkeeping. 
Why? Is one stenographer in ten in large cities expected 
to do anything with bookkeeping? Why should not pro- 
grams be based upon the actual requirements of the field? 
A young woman who could prove her competency as ste- 
nographer and bookkeeper could, of course, command places 
of special opportunity or need. A few persons who are at 
once competent in stenography and commercial Spanish are 
required, especially in seaports, just as are a few dentists or 
lawyers who know Spanish. Let these double vocations be 
properly analyzed, prepared for, and the followers thereof 
rewarded as they deserve. 

But the commercial market can absorb multitudes of girls 
and boys who cannot afford to take prolonged preparation. 
Girls to operate typewriters and dictaphones ; boys for mes- 
senger service; girls for filing, or for selling specialties; boys 
for operating calculating machines — thousands of these 
posts often essentially for juveniles, sometimes for adults, 
qualified only for routine specialist work are now to be found 
and their proportion relative to the whole range of commer- 
cial vocations is certainly destined to increase. For each of 
these callings vestibule or upgrading education is no less 



Commercial Education 203 

possible than is direct education for the trade of stenog- 
rapher, profession of accountant, or derived calHng of ex- 
ecutive. Only the addiction of some educators to the prayer 
wheels of routine will prevent the early recognition of these 
facts and the provision of means of dealing with them in 
accordance with sound principles of social economy. 



CHAPTER VII 

INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION 
I 

Scope and Specialization. — For the present, in the ab- 
sence of better classifications, we shall include among the 
*' industrial " vocations all occupations of mining, manufac- 
turing, and transportation, as well as the true handicraft 
trades such as house carpentry, dressmaking, cigar making, 
and the like. But certain forms of higher expert service — 
engineers, analysts, inspectors — as well as the higher ex- 
ecutives found in industries will tend to be classified among 
the professions, as is now the case with civil engineering. 

Examination of the census classifications given in Appen- 
dix A reveals in part the extensive occupational subdivision 
of productive processes which is constantly proceeding in 
the industrial occupations. From the beginnings of re- 
corded history, indeed, there has been increasing subdivi- 
sion and specialization of the trades. The great extensions 
of use of power and applied science found in recent decades 
has enormously increased the number and increasingly dif- 
ferentiated the character of all elaborative and transporta- 
tion vocations. The classifications used by the census are 
far short of revealing the actual facts. In every highly 
developed manufacturing area — the English Midlands, 
Massachusetts, Westphalia, the Ohio Valley, Japan, North- 
ern France — it is safe to assert that from one to two thou- 
sand distinct industrial specializations of service are recog- 
nized by employers and employees. Not all of these, of 
course, have long established standards or distinct labor 

204 



Industrial Educatian 205 

organizations. Census enumerators find it convenient to 
*' lump " workers in shoe, cotton, pottery, or munitions fac- 
tories as *' semi-skilled " operatives. As new machines are 
invented, old occupations give way, and new ones appear, 
often in great variety. 

The evolution of the factory system of production (that 
is, for elaborative processes chiefly), causes the complete 
disappearance of ancient handicraft trades in some fields — 
such as those of shoemaker, weaver, cooper, potter; the par- 
tial disappearance of others — tailor, dressmaker, teamster, 
glass blower, silversmith, compositor; and the profound 
modification of others — butcher, baker, furniture maker, 
book binder, jeweler, plumber, brickmaker. 

This evolution has affected less the industrial trades 
involving production of raw materials — mining, lumber- 
ing, quarrying — and the building trades, for the reason that 
operating conditions still force these industries to remain in 
a measure dispersed. Cotton cloth and even ready-made 
clothing can be produced in great central establishments; 
but the production of only some parts of houses — doors, 
plumbing, and other fixed equipment — can be similarly 
concentrated. Modern transportation — of ideas (by mail, 
telegraph and telephone) as well as material commodities — 
requires a large degree of dispersal of operations; but, nev- 
ertheless, railway and boat transportation, as well as teleg- 
raphy and telephony have permitted and required very exten- 
sive subdivision and specialization of occupations. 

Historic Apprenticeship. — Vocational education for many 
of the handicraft trades was greatly perfected ages ago as 
apprenticeship. For long periods certain of these trades 
were " possessed " by hereditary clans. For long periods 
also they were held by guilds which were given monopolies, 
and which standardized and evolved the skills and " mys- 
teries " involved. From the sociological point of view it is 
evident that apprenticeship was a natural and, under normal 



2o6 Vocational Education 

conditions, effective, method of vocational training where 
production was so dispersed that men worked almost one 
by one. " Man and helper " would thus naturally develop 
close relationships. The opportunities for the learner to 
" copy " the craft of the elder " master " would be innumer- 
able. A period of journeymanship — experience in work- 
ing with craftsmen at a distance from the home town — 
would naturally offset the effects of excessive " inbreeding." 
Even when the making of special types of cloth, armor, pot- 
tery, jewelry, and saddlery were, in the Middle Ages, concen- 
trated in certain cities, it would appear that production was 
still carried on largely in individual small shops, often con- 
sisting only of the master and his " apprentice " (who fre- 
quently " lived in " and, in popular romance, eventually 
married the daughter of his master) working in rooms 
adjoining or even constituting a part of the residence. 

The progressive impairment and disappearance of appren- 
ticeship education has inevitably followed the changing of 
conditions of production. Apprenticeship has little chance 
where workers are aggregated. Specialization of routine 
service will inevitably take place. Furthermore, appren- 
ticeship seems to belong best to those stages in economic 
evolution when methods of production have become a true 
practical art, but have not reached the stage when " applied 
science " can be said to control. The making, as well as 
the working into serviceable tools, of iron and steel were 
" arts " long before the scientific principles underlying the 
processes were understood as in modern metallurgy. In 
the language of the time, they were " mysteries." Imita- 
tion, prolonged and painstaking, was the necessary method 
of learning. There were no direct and speedy ways to the 
acquisition of skills, and " technical knowledge " consisted 
chiefly of traditions. 

The naive assumption is sometimes made by amateur 
economists and sociologists that men work or should work 



Industrial Education 207 

" for the joy of working " ; but this, of course, is an assump- 
tion of artistic romanticism and of impractically ideahstic 
philosophies. Men '' work " now as they always have 
'' worked " primarily to produce enough utilities wherewith 
to sustain an approved standard of living. Doubtless all 
persons are in greater or less degree endowed with " play " 
instincts which evolve in some individuals to the point that, 
at maturity, gives us the creative artist, inventor, explorer, 
or entertainer. But it is doubtful use of language to call 
these efforts " work " in the sense that the term is generally 
employed to designate the endless routine, body-straining 
processes whereby men provide for needs of food, shelter, 
defense, movement, health, learning, worship, and justice. 

It is possible that men of the temperate and frigid zones 
have so long worked that certain ill-defined instincts have 
been ''acquired" {pace the biologist) which render the 
individual unhappy if he be given no opportunity to develop 
them. (Few men would contend that races long resident 
in the tropics have any such insistent instincts.) It is also 
certain that, given a long period of habituation to regular and 
absorbing work {e.g. between the ages of twelve and thirty), 
an individual is likely to be unhappy thereafter if deprived 
of opportunity to go on with his favorite employment. 

But these are variant and derivative conditions. The 
fundamental sociological as well as psychological fact is 
that men work to produce, first the necessities, then the 
ardently desired luxuries of life, and they are always bent 
on doing this in the most expeditious way possible. If 
combination of effort will give better results in terms of 
exchangeable goods than individualized effort, then sooner 
or later, and beset by the many vicissitudes involved in 
learning new customs, we shall find men working in aggre- 
gates or companies. If the increased harnessing of natural 
powers will help towards the same end, then we may expect 
wind and water, steam and gas to be used instead of man 
and animal power. 



2o8 Vocational Education 

Hence a certain inevitability has characterized modern 
industrial evolution. Development of facilities for trans- 
portation has made profitable territorial specialization of 
production. Brazil specializes in coffee and rubber; the 
American Western Plateau in cattle; Florida and California 
in fruit; Pennsylvania and Westphalia in coal and iron; 
Michigan and Washington in lumber products. Localities 
which have started on certain types of factory production 
localize and specialize along these lines, giving us regions 
of specialized manufacture like Connecticut, Manchester, 
Lille-Roubaix, and Detroit. 

Under these conditions, nearly all old forms of appren- 
ticeship education have given way. In those trades that 
still retain features of handicraft production — plumbing, 
printing, dressmaking — survivals of apprenticeship still 
persist. In a few modern occupations — of which perhaps 
locomotive engineering is the best example — new types of 
apprenticeship, sometimes apparently very effective, have 
developed. But, in general, modern manufacturing knows 
little of apprenticeship; modern transportation presents a 
few new forms only, while the building trades retain not 
a few survivals, but for which the supplementing aid of 
trade schools is being increasingly asked. Printing, ma- 
chine shop work (iron and steel chiefly), and a few ancil- 
lary trades such as pattern making, molding, and station 
electrical work retain or have developed forms of more or 
less organized apprenticeship education, and these are the 
fields in which some significant trade school education has 
evolved. 

Trade School Education. — In appraising modern devel- 
opments of basic industrial education certain fundamental 
facts must be remembered: (a) Educational as well as pop- 
ular opinion has chiefly interpreted industrial education as 
'' trade " education. Factory, mining, and transportation 
pursuits have obviously been followed in large part by what 



Industrial Education 209 

ill-informed opinion denominates " unskilled " workers, and 
which census enumerators, with hardly more accuracy, clas- 
sify as " semi-skilled " operatives. The trades, therefore, 
have constituted the aristocracy of the industrial occupa- 
tions. The public vocational school has been either too 
restricted or too inefficient to serve as a satisfactory means 
of access to them thus far. 

{h) The introduction of manual training has been ap- 
proved by the public because of vague convictions that some- 
how it would give basic, or at any rate rudimentary, trade 
training. Manual training found its chief available open- 
ings in woodworking, with metal working and printing in 
remote second place, and leather and clay working as occa- 
sional suggestions. The earlier technical schools for boys 
found the transition from laboratory to certain forms of 
shop work in electricity not difficult. Hence, when it was 
perceived by school authorities that something more sub- 
stantial than manual training was needed to meet popular 
demands for vocational training for the industrial occupa- 
tions it was natural that the going forms of manual training 
should furnish the chief source of working suggestions as 
well as, not infrequently, teachers and equipment. But, 
necessarily, these were in the already tested fields. Wood- 
working, as an indoor vocation, became ''cabinet-making," 
notwithstanding that the cabinet-maker's trade (as a han- 
dicraft) is nearly extinct in America. Electrical work took 
the direction of indoor wiring. Some brave transitions 
from machine woodworking, to ''turning" and "pattern- 
making " were tried until it was realized what a small de- 
mand existed in modern industry for specialists in these 
fields. Machine metal working and printing developed 
more realistic work, although even here existing trade schools 
are still greatly wanting in standards of performance, a 
condition which is indicated by the indeterminateness of their 
connections with apprenticeship and operative specialties. 



2IO Vocational Education 

(c) Philanthropy, interested in providing for boys and 
girls deprived of their natural protectors, first pioneered the 
way in the establishment of trade schools. In a few cases, 
even of schools established many years ago, standards were 
reasonably definite and practical. But publicly supported 
industrial schools have seldom become more than half- 
developed technical schools — that is, schools imparting in- 
formation about one or more trades, but giving little prac- 
tical training in its processes. As in the case of other types 
of vocational schools — agricultural, commercial, home- 
making, and even, as stated elsewhere, professional — the 
general educator thinks of vocational competency chiefly in 
terms of knowledge. He desires to leave to non-school 
agencies the imparting of skill, of which, it would often 
seem, he has a low opinion at best. 

It is from the basis of the foregoing considerations that 
we must study and appraise contemporary efforts looking 
to basic school industrial education. Existing day schools 
have been severely handicapped by tradition; their promot- 
ers have seldom faced the realities of modern industrial 
evolution; they have never known just how far they ought 
to go in giving direct vocational education, rather than some 
mystic " general " or " indirect " vocational instruction; and 
they have never been quite clear as to what portions of a 
rounded vocational education they should be responsible 
for. The well-informed reader will recall a few, but only 
a few, noteworthy exceptions to the foregoing character- 
izations. One of the most needed works of research and 
survey now is an evaluative investigation of existing private 
and public day industrial schools. 

Evening Industrial Schools Evening industrial schools 

for extension education have rarely extended to other fields 
of operation than day schools attempting basic education. 
Naturally their extension courses have dealt with related 
technical subjects rather than with practical training. How- 



Industrial Education 



211 



ever imperfect their methods, they have been in results 
probably fairly effective means of technical instruction for 
those trades that increasingly require the interpretations 
and supplementings of applied science, art, and mathematics, 
since their instruction is in greater or less degree correlated 
with, and, in the few really good courses, actually integrated 
into, the practical experience being gained by the learner 
from day to day in productive work. 

Historically, several impediments have been encountered 
in the development of evening extension industrial educa- 
tion, (a) Intellectual energies are in most people at low 
ebb after a ten or even an eight hour working day, even in 
occupations involving much routine, {h) Evening school 
courses have usually been general in their nature and in rare 
cases only, at all closely correlated with practical experience 
obtained in apprenticeship or factory participation, (c) 
Teachers could not be trained for, or even primarily em- 
ployed for, evening school instruction. (J) Little could 
be done in the way of systematic supervision of evening 
school-teaching or in the preparation of courses for it. 

The shortening of the working day is probably helping 
solve the problem of the fagged student. Recent legislation 
tends to deny to students under 17 or even 18 years of age 
admission to evening classes. But it is probable that for 
many workers, nature itself has created persistent barriers 
against obtaining satisfactory results from night school 
attendance. For young workers short course or part time 
training will be the line most effective in the future; 
while for mature workers short course and " dull season " 
full time ''upgrading" instruction on the one hand, and 
correspondence and other '' self help " forms of extension 
education on the other, will be found capable of almost in- 
definite development. 

Decided progress has been made in recent years towards 
the " short unit " extension course as the basic factor in 



212 Vocational Education 

evening instruction. The short unit is pedagogically 
adapted to the usual type of evening school student; more 
than the general, and often severely logical, " long course/' 
which was too often designed to insure mastery of a scheme 
of " principles," it is capable of being correlated with the 
actual experience of the learner — if not consciously by 
the teacher, at least partially by the efforts of the learner 
himself. Large opportunities still exist for creating out of 
all possible evening school students in a given area groups 
fairly homogeneous as respects development and occupa- 
tions being followed and for providing them with courses 
of '' short unit " instruction which will definitely and visibly 
reinforce their vocational competency. But one of th.' larg- 
est opportunities for effective work in this field is still largely 
unrecognized by educators — namely, the union of the 
methods of direct evening school instruction with those of 
correspondence school instruction in order to devise a new 
type of presentation having the merits of each and the 
defects of neither. If, for example, a young mechanic is 
prepared to give to extension work in related drawing the 
equivalent of twenty winter weeks, a short unit assignment 
could be made to him in a pamphlet of fifteen or twenty 
pages containing detailed and explicit directions and prob- 
lems for work. An average of two hours each two weeks 
could be required for conference with the instructor and 
the presentation of work accomplished. These conferences 
could be arranged for groups or for individuals. It should 
be remembered that a fundamental, if not the primary, 
object of extension education is to render the individual 
increasingly capable of relying upon himself in advancing his 
powers over his vocation. Evening school instruction as now 
organized seeks that end purposefully even to a less extent 
than day school instruction. Obviously such procedure is 
very expensive and often of doubtful value. Correspond- 
ence instruction, on the other hand, is valuable in that it 



Indtistrial Education 213 

throws the learner constantly back upon his own efforts; 
but the absence of personal contact discourages the large 
majority who take it. 

The provision of specially qualified teachers and super- 
visors presents endless difficulties at present when basic day 
school education is so imperfectly developed. But if, as 
may well be surmised, short course day schools of indus- 
trial education greatly increase in the near future, it will 
be readily practicable to provide plans for the utilization of 
properly qualified teachers in both day and evening schools. 

Continuation Schools. — In current plans for the reorgan- 
ization of public education in France and England the most 
far-reaching proposals are those which contemplate requir- 
ing continuation school attendance up to 18 years of age. 
It is well known that in the educationally more progressive 
states of Germany — Saxony, Wiirtemberg, and Bavaria, 
among others — continuation school attendance up to 16 
or 17 and, in a few cases, 18 years of age has been obli- 
gatory; while in less progressive Prussia some beginnings 
had also been made before 1914. 

In America continuation school attendance is now (Jan., 
1919) compulsory in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, in Bos- 
ton and in one or two cities in Ohio. In several states con- 
tinuation school bills are being drawn for presentation to 
the pending legislatures. In many respects the continuation 
school is one of the most actively developing forms of edu- 
cation, if not in practice, at least in theory. 

There still exist, however, many misconceptions regard- 
ing the possibilities of continuation schools. How far can the 
continuation school actually contribute to vocational compe- 
tency? Frank examination of this question, in the light of 
such knowledge as is currently available, is always desir- 
able. The following findings, stated dogmatically for the 
sake of brevity, express the writer's present convictions, 
formed after some years of study of, and experience with, 
continuation school work: 



214 Vocational Education 

1. It is entirely in accordance with sound public policy 
that the compulsory full-time attendance of children in 
day schools up to the age of 14 should be supplemented by 
compulsory part-time or continuation school attendance up 
to 16 or preferably 18. We may therefore expect all states, 
in proportion to their educational progressiveness, to enact 
compulsory continuation school legislation during the next 
few years. 

2. The essence of the continuation school lies in two 
facts : that attendance is within the ordinary working day ; 
and that attendance is obligatory on all persons of specific 
ages not otherwise attending schools. Hence, in the true 
meaning of terms, evening schools or other out-of- working 
hours schools are not continuation schools; and no effective 
results can be achieved, practically, from voluntary contin- 
uation school attendance except within single establish- 
ments employing very large numbers. 

3. The aims of the continuation school education may be 
vocational, or general. In every case it is peculiarly impor- 
tant for this type of school that aims, purposes, or objec- 
tives, be clearly defined, and with reference to particular 
groups of pupils. The aims for girls will differ from those 
for boys ; the aims for retarded pupils will differ from those 
for bright pupils ; the aims for the healthy will differ from 
those for the unhealthy; the aims for those employed in 
the factory callings cannot be the same as those for the 
mercantile callings. 

4. The general education offered at any given time in the 
continuation school may be chiefly designed to make up for 
deficiencies of previous general education; or to add new 
contributions along special and novel fields. For the time 
being it may confine itself chiefly to the department of 
physical education or to social (civic and moral) education, 
or to cultural education. 

5. Vocational education given in the continuation school 



Industrial Education 215 

may be either basic or extension, according as it is designed 
to teach a new occupation or to advance the learner in the 
occupation he is already following. 

6. Opportunities to give genuine basic vocational educa- 
tion on a continuation school basis between the years of 14 
and 16 will probably be found to be few. Between the ages 
of 16 and 18 better results may possibly be had in manufac- 
turing and commercial centers, especially if attendance of 
from 8 to 15 hours per week can be assured. 

7. Opportunities to give extension vocational education 
at any age will obviously depend upon the wage-earning 
employments being followed by the young workers. In 
such fields of work as agriculture, salesmanship, office work, 
and the handicrafts, the opportunities should be good. In 
the factory callings where the young workers serve chiefly 
as operative specialists or helpers, the opportunities are 
probably not good (although the whole matter is much in 
need of investigation). 

8. In general, it is not to be expected that the contin- 
uation school by itself can solve the problems of vocational 
education for children from 14 to 16 years of age. But it 
can do much, if properly handled, to develop and improve 
their cultural and civic education, especially because its 
pupils are, during part of their time receiving the very real 
and helpful education of contact with the actualities of life 
in wage-earning work. 

9. The ideal plan for the continuation school designed 
for workers in highly organized fields of production — 
factories, department stores, etc. — is such as will permit 
the workers to give half of adult working time to wage- 
earning employment — thereby making double shifts of 
young workers possible. Juvenile workers could be de- 
barred from working more than five hours per day, or 
thirty hours a week ; and, concurrently, be required to attend 
school at least three hours a day or fifteen hours a week. 



2i6 Vocational Education 

10. Continuation school education can be made valuable 
only by providing specially adjusted courses of study and 
specially selected and trained teachers. If we do not pro- 
vide these, the time spent in schools by pupils will be a time 
of profitless boredom or of holiday mischief-making, accord- 
ing to the severity of the disciplinary methods employed. 

11. By specially adjusted courses of study, in general or 
in vocational education, is meant, in part, short unit courses, 
focusing upon objectives of achievement easily comprehen- 
sible to the pupil and capable of being consciously related 
by him to his needs, deficiencies, or interests ; and, in part, 
adapted courses, permitting such methods of treatment as 
will relate the materials and ends to the learner's outside 
experience, vocational or non-vocational. 

12. Probably young teachers should never be employed 
in continuation schools. These should be promotional posi- 
tions, presupposing maturity, selection for special fitness, 
and a short course of professional training — possibly 100 
hours of extension study, or 180 hours, six weeks, of six 
hour a day special preparation. 

13. In administrative charge of continuation schools in 
state and municipality, where practicable, should be a special 
administrator aided by special supervisors, qualified to do 
experimental work as well as to perpetuate routine per- 
formance. 

II 

The War's Effects on Industrial Education. — It is often 
said that modern war is essentially an engineering enterprise. 
But to an unprecedented extent the Great War was likewise 
a manufacturing and transportation enterprise. At any 
given time fully as many workers were exclusively employed 
in war work in the '' second " (transportation and supply) 
and "third" (production) lines of defense as in the strictly 
aggressive enterprises at the front. 



Industrial Education 217 

It was therefore to be expected that in the hurried and 
far-flung preparation for war which the United States was 
obhged to make, much experience both as to the needs and 
as to the processes of industrial education should have been 
developed. The following are submitted as tentative find- 
ings in the subject: 

1. The war did nothing to abate society's faith in the 
need of publicly supported and publicly controlled vocational 
education. In numerous ways it accentuated the need and 
revealed the possibilities of special forms of that education. 
For success in war, for success in state building, for the 
furtherance of efficient democracy, it has become increas- 
ingly clear that peoples who are to advance in the struggle 
for survival and for worthy social achievement must have 
more and better vocational education than ever before. 
That can be had only through cooperative effort — probably 
only through state support and state control, as are now 
accepted policies for various grades of cultural and civic 
education. 

2. As a means of playing its part in the war America 
embarked on vocational and especially on industrial educa- 
tion on an heroic scale. Every cantonment became in effect a 
gigantic boarding school designed to train men for the tem- 
porary vocations of war. Officers' training camps trained 
thousands of men for war leadership often by means of 
courses only a few months in length. In shipyards and 
munitions factories, the government promoted the estab- 
lishment of hundreds of special classes to train men and 
women for new vocations in turning out the standardized 
implements used directly or indirectly in martial operations. 
The government used existing schools of engineering and 
industrial education to train in short intensive courses thou- 
sands of specialists for sustaining service to the army and 
navy. It sent hundreds of thousands of young men, not 
yet old enough for active service, to colleges and schools of 



2i8 Vocational Education 

general and vocational education, where it designed to fit 
them for early military service as officers or technical spe- 
cialists. It encouraged manufacturers to establish '' vesti- 
bule," "upgrading," and other training department schools 
within factories, as a means of making trained labor out of 
untrained labor volunteers. 

3. Economic Tendencies. — The demands of the war con- 
tributed to the clearing up of some matters in the economic 
world. War obviously intensifies consumption of some famil- 
iar kinds; but it also creates new demands upon an enormous 
scale. For this war America needed large quantities of wheat, 
sugar, woolen goods, castor oil, tin cups, binoculars, and 
surgical bandages. We were forced to produce enormous 
quantities of rifles, aeroplanes, motor trucks, shells, gas 
masks, carbolic acid, explosives, and wrist watches. In all 
these fields the pressure has been constant for quantity pro- 
duction of standardized parts or commodities. America's 
business preparedness for quantity production was, from 
the start, good ; and such success as we achieved in the war 
is to be attributed more to our capacity for large scale work 
than to any other one factor. As a people we utilize me- 
chanical power to perform work, instead of hand power, 
wherever possible. As a people we prefer wholesale pro- 
duction to retail. We take kindly to expensive and 
complicated machines if they will bear the burdens of large 
production, if they can " deliver the goods." We pride our- 
selves on our " big things " — ships, cars, mines, buildings, 
factories, schools. We like to see operations carried out 
on a large scale, part coordinating smoothly with part. And 
where we could move toward, or in war on, a huge scale, in 
an efficient manner, we have had confidence in the outcome. 

4. But the very success of all this in war, undoubtedly 
means for the future greater use of capital, mechanical 
appliances, large scale output and subdivision of process in 
industry, commerce, agriculture, and even in many of the 



\ 



Industrial Education 219 

professions. It means the accelerated decline of handicraft 
production, the " all-round " trades, historic apprenticeship, 
economic individualism, the " practical arts." It involves 
progressively the vocational (but not cultural or civic) 
specialization of the inventor, the manager, the foreman, the 
inspector, and even the routine worker himself. It suggests 
the importance of a " selective service " for each large 
establishment, the use of scientific methods in employment, 
" upgrading," transfer and dismissal of workers. It cer- 
tainly greatly complicates the problems of vocational educa- 
tion of all kinds. It is to be feared that it presents a dis- 
couraging outlook to those who seek, as they think, to revive 
or to develop the "creative impulse" of an historic type, 
although it no less surely opens up to all workers opportu- 
nities for culture and civic usefulness of kinds heretofore 
unsuspected in industry. It throws a heavy burden of proof 
upon those who would see our industrial S3^stem funda- 
mentally transformed, in face of rapidly increasing popula- 
tion, rising standards of living, demands for increased 
leisure, and diminishing natural resources. 

5. For it is much to be doubted if we can reverse present 
tendencies of economic evolution. We can search out and 
prevent some of their pathologic effects on human beings, 
for pathologic effects they certainly have, as have had all 
other social and economic transitions since men first emerged 
from the woods of our primate ancestors and began to 
build fires, invent tools, wear clothes, and employ speech. 
If the harnessing of the natural forces of wind, water, steam, 
electricity, and exploding gas means that man can produce 
the maximum of goods by organizing such mechanisms as 
will enable him to bring water by turning a spigot, light his 
buildings by turning a button, draw his trains by sitting at 
a lever, plow the earth from the vantage of a comfortable 
seat, cut coal with a power driven chain-saw, or weave cloth 
with a battery of automatic stop looms, then certainly large 



220 Vocational Education 

numbers of our future workers will, during their working 
hours, be, in the best sense of the word, machine tenders, 
although outside of working hours we hope that they will 
be cultivated men and women, interested in matters of per- 
sonal development and civic usefulness. It may be, indeed, 
that as a means of achieving the maximum of social growth, 
we shall not in the future have our youth begin on special- 
ized productive work until mature years have been reached, 
that we shall all work in gainful routine employment but a 
few hours each day, and that outside of hours devoted to 
production we shall engage ourselves as amateurs in response 
to ancient instincts of workmanship and invention. But we 
shall not expect back-yard gardening to supply even in small 
part the world's demands for wheat, beef, sugar, rubber, 
cotton, and milk. We shall encourage amateur craftsmen in 
all their hobbies for the sake of the personal development 
these afford, but without seriously expecting them to min- 
ister to the world's gigantic demands for cotton cloth, ships, 
paper, printed matter, picture films, canned fruits, furniture, 
cars, or transportation. We are probably destined to see our 
Chinas and Indias following in the wake of the western 
world in their efforts to stave ofT hunger, disease, and other 
concomitants of low productivity, by means of large scale 
production. If one of the eflFects of social evolution — 
accompanying less frequent wars, diminished disease, new 
inventions, intensive cultivation — is a steadily increasing 
population and another is rising standards of living, then it 
is certain that old methods of production will not sufilice. 
In spite of the regrets and misgivings of the conservatives 
we must expect increased use of machinery, larger use of 
the capital that machine production requires, greater regi- 
mentation — self initiated and democratic, we hope — of 
workers, greater subdivision of productive process, and 
greater specialization of operatives from industrial general 
to workshop private. But we have also a right to expect 



Industrial Education 



221 



from it more democracy, more prosperity, greater spiritual 
possessions. William Vaughan Moody thinks of " indus- 
trialism " as a brute, which, untamed and destructive at first, 
must be domesticated to man's uses : 



The Brute ^ 

Through his might men work their wills. 

They have boweled out the hills 

For food to keep him toiling in the cages they have wrought; 

And they fling him, hour by hour, 

Limbs of men to give him power; 

Brains of men to give him cunning; and for dainties to devour 

Children's souls, the little worth ; hearts of women, cheaply bought : 

He takes them and he breaks them, but he gives them scanty thought. 

For about the noisy land, 

Roaring, quivering 'neath his hand, 

His thoughts brood fierce and sullen or laugh in lust of pride 

O'er the stubborn things that he 

Breaks to dust and brings to be. 

Some he mightily establishes, some flings down utterly. 

There is thunder in his stride, nothing ancient can abide, 

When he hales the hills together and bridles up the tide. 

They who caught and bound him tight 

Laughed exultant at his might. 

Saying, " Now behold, the good time comes for the weariest and the 

least ! 
We will use this lusty knave : 
No more need for men to slave ; 

We may rise and look about us and have knowledge ere the grave." 
But the Brute said in his breast, " Till the mills I grind have ceased, 
The riches shall be dust of dust, dry ashes be the feast. 

" On the strong and cunning few 

Cynic favors I will strew; 

I will stuff their maw with overplus until their spirit dies ; 

From the patient and the low 

I will take the joys they know; 

They shall hunger after vanities and still an-hungered go. 

Madness shall be on the people, ghastly jealousies arise; 

Brother's blood shall cry on brother up the dead and empty skies." 

1 Quoted from the collected poems of Wm. Vaughan Moody by per- 
mission of the publishers, Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston. 



222 



Vocational Education 



So he plotted in his rage : 

So he deals it, age by age. 

But even as he roared his curse a still small Voice befell ; 

Lo, a still and pleasant voice bade them none the less rejoice, 

For the Brute must bring the good time on ; he has no other choice. 

He may struggle, sweat, and yell, but he knows exceeding well 

He must work them out salvation ere they send him back to helL 

All the desert that he made 

He must treble bless with shade, 

In primal wastes set precious seed of rapture and of pain; 

All the strongholds that he built 

For the powers of greed and guilt — 

He must strew their bastions down the sea and choke their towers with 

silt; 
He must make the temples clean for the gods to come again, 
And shift the lordly cities under skies without a stain. 

In a very cunning tether 

He must lead the tyrant weather ; 

He must loose the curse of Adam from the worn neck of the race ; 

He must cast out hate and fear, 

Dry away each fruitless tear, 

And make the fruitful tears to gush from the deep heart and clear. 

He must give each man his portion, each his pride and worthy place ; 

He must batter down the arrogant and lift the weary face, 

On each vile mouth set purity, on each low forehead grace. 



6. Education for Specialized Industries. — What does all 
this mean to education, vocational and general ? In the first 
place it clearly indicates the need of all the vital effective 
general education — cultural and civic — that we can secure 
on behalf of all our citizens, in order that they may appre- 
ciate, understand and control the very complex economic 
and political conditions under which civilization in the future 
is to advance and be conserved. 

Much of the training and instruction now given in the 
grades is very imperfectly functional for modern conditions, 
and it is the writer's conviction that most of the offerings of 
the high school are almost valueless from the standpoint of 
the cultural and civic requirements of to-day. 



^ 



Industrial Education 223 

For all our pupils we need to extend and enrich oppor- 
tunities for cultural, civic, and physical education. By all 
feasible means we must induce our young people to remain 
in full time, continuation or evening extension schools as 
long as they can profit from them. Even now nearly half 
our young people in more advanced communities are remain- 
ing in schools of general education until sixteen years of 
age. The proportion of the population remaining in full 
time schools, the primary purposes of which are civic and 
cultural education, is steadily rising throughout America. 
And the day is not far off when we can require continuation 
school attendance up to eighteen years of age, partly as a 
means of preparing our citizens for the larger civic respon- 
sibilities they must carry in the future. As respects voca- 
tional education, impending changes accelerated by the war 
will unquestionably be of a sweeping character. We are now 
learning the futility of manual training, mechanical drawing, 
bookkeeping, shop mathematics, textbook agriculture, and 
laboratory home economics as means of preparation for the 
great majority of vocations, however valuable factors they 
may be in general education. Even our best trade schools 
— of dressmaking, plumbing, carpentry, millinery, electrical 
installation, machine-shop practice and printing — feel 
themselves continually balked by the dissolving processes 
taking place within the historic vocations for which they 
seek to give training. Our schools (not the colleges) of 
agriculture succeed with extension vocational education 
chiefly, and have only in rare instances learned to give basic 
vocational agricultural education, even when they know 
whether they have the skilled " hired man," the tenant, or 
the owning farmer in view as the product of their training. 
We are not satisfied with our commercial schools which 
offer vocational education for only two out of possible scores 
of vocations. As for our dominant factory callings — those 
which produce our lumber, furniture, cloth, guns, shoes, 



224 Vocational Education 

tools, machinery, packed foods, drugs, jewelry, books, news- 
papers, clothes, ships, sugar, flour, etc. — we had made 
hardly a pretense of offering vocational training for them 
until forced by the emergencies born of the war. Clearly 
we must forge ahead, learning more about vocational edu- 
cation adapted to modern conditions. 

7. Vestibule and Upgrading Schools. — We have not yet 
seriously faced the problem of providing vocational educa- 
tion for those specialized agencies of production that were 
so largely instrumental in helping win the war. The vesti- 
bule and upgrading schools rapidly developed in factories 
for war supplies when the United States Employment Serv- 
ice stopped the free migration of workers, suggest many 
possibilities. These may be inferred from an imaginary 
description of a large plant with highly subdivided oper- 
ative processes. 

Let us imagine to ourselves a great manufacturing con- 
cern employing 20,000 workers ranging from managers and 
scientists at salaries of from $5,000 to $25,000, through 
foremen and inspectors earning from $2,000 to $4,000 per 
year, skilled men at from $1,200 to $2,000, and down to 
operatives, in many cases girls and boys from sixteen to 
twenty years of age, earning from $400 for the juvenile 
employees to $800 to $1,200 for those of greater maturity, 
experience, skill, and technical knowledge. 

Because of its organization, use of science and modern 
machinery, magnitude and favorable location, we are jus- 
tified in assuming this establishment can produce goods of 
approved quality at relatively low cost. We may also 
assume that partly as the effects of legislation and partly 
as outcome of advanced standards, voluntarily accepted by 
employees and employers, this factory maintains approved 
conditions of lighting, hygiene, hours of labor, use of safety 
devices, etc. 

For the purpose of recruiting labor — from the most to 



Industrial Education 225 

the least expert — the concern possesses an employment 
department which, by means of carefully devised tests, 
ascertains the probable serviceability of all those seeking 
work. Supplementing this employment department are 
training departments in which beginners or more mature 
workers ready for advancement are given a few days or a 
few weeks training on productive work in some simple 
operating specialty, receiving in the meantime an agreed 
upon proportion of the wage for a full-responsibility worker 
in that department or operation. If the worker comes to 
the factory with previous experience, he will naturally be 
assigned to that department for full productive work or 
for further training in which he can render the best of pro- 
ductive service for himself and for the establishment, 
according to his experience and maturity. 

Let us assume the cases of several boys of sixteen enter- 
ing the work of this factory for the first time. In the light 
of our present knowledge and control of economic and 
educational conditions what could be done to insure best 
opportunities for these boys in their vocational evolution? 
It is to be assumed that in a factory of the magnitude here 
described there are many kinds of work and many grades of 
compensation, and that the boys themselves will vary mate- 
rially as to their potential powers and future possibilities. 

Before the boys begin to work, they are tested. They 
are employed for departments using large numbers of 
juvenile workers, sometimes as operating specialists. Be- 
fore beginning '' full responsibility " work they are sent on 
half wages to a training department (for their specialties). 
Here, working full time, and on jobs that are similar to 
those they are later to undertake, they receive intensive 
training for three days, three weeks, or three months, de- 
pending on the difficulties of the processes they are to under- 
take and on their own learning powers. In the training 
departments, the primary educational processes will usually be 

Q 



226 Vocational Education 

training for skill — for accuracy, speed, safe action, etc., 
since production by harnessed powers requires this first of 
all. But in so far as technical knowledge can be related to, 
or is in any way required in, the productive processes it 
also will be given. Lectures and reading matter will like- 
wise be given to the learner to enlighten him as to the pur- 
poses, social significance, organization, and evolution of the 
great economic structure of which he has become a living 
part. Other reading and lectures will enlighten him as to 
his future personal opportunities in the plant. By yet other 
means he will be informed as to organizations formed by 
workers for self-help, advancement of their calling, cooper- 
ative participation in administration, etc. 

Our young workers, after a period spent in ** vestibule " 
schools, will then become full-fledged wage-earners, but, of 
course, on what are still essentially juvenile occupations. 
The more capable and ambitious of these boys will, however, 
soon desire advancement to more difficult and better paying 
work. For them are provided '* upgrading " schools or 
departments. Like the vestibule schools for beginners, 
these '* upgrading " schools offer, usually, short intensive 
courses of training for advanced specialties. Pupils for 
these are recruited from the more promising workers on 
simpler and less well-paid processes. 

Given opportunities of the kind here suggested, we are 
justified in assuming that the more ambitious and gifted 
boys will push on from level to level. As they reach twenty- 
two to thirty years of age some of them will become aware 
of their possession of natural powers of leadership. They 
will see possibiHties of becoming foremen, inspectors, man- 
agers, inventors, technical specialists. They will attend 
special upgrading schools, correspondence schools, or else 
take a year or two off to go to a technical school or college 
in the field of their special interest. 

The boys to whom nature has been niggardly of gifts 



Industrial Education 227 

cannot, of course, rise to these heights. But neither can 
they remain too long in the juvenile operative specialties or 
those in which they will have to compete with girls or young, 
unmarried men workers. Sooner or later they must utilize 
the upgrading school to reach operations offering compen- 
sation sufficient to support a family. Even when they have 
reached such a specialty many of them may be expected to 
take training for other specialties in order to avoid ruts, 
to have, in time of change, more than one arrow in their 
quivers. 

Is not the plan of vocational education here suggested the 
only one that will assist our workers in modern highly 
specialized productive enterprises? Is it not the only one 
adapted to factories for textiles, locomotives, firearms, jew- 
elry, clothing, furniture, packed meats, books, newspapers, 
automobiles, shoes, stoves, and buttons? Is it not the only 
one adapted to commercial education for department stores, 
large banks, commission houses, large offices? May not 
something analogous to it be the best means of training 
young men for the successive farming stages of skilled farm 
hand, tenant farmer on a major and two minor specialties, 
and finally owning farmer? 

8. It is sometimes questioned whether, outside of war- 
time, vocational education of the kind here mentioned should 
be supported at public expense. Some unthinking people 
complain that it benefits only employers. They say, " let in- 
dustry train its own workers." But they fail to realize that 
good training of physicians benefits all of us, since we are 
likewise private employers of physicians. Good training 
of any sort benefits us or our representatives as employers, 
and also as emplo3^ees. But, complain the unreflecting, the 
employer gets all the benefit. How is this possible so long 
as there are varying wage scales within a given factory and 
workers, after training, come into the higher scales? For 
the present we have to assume the operation of laws of 



228 Vocational Education 

supply and demand in fixing shares of the worker's product 
that are to go, respectively, to interest on investment, depre- 
ciation of plant, overhead charges, profits of enterprisers, 
and wages. Like the law of gravity, the law of supply and 
demand is always operative, always limiting. We can, on 
occasion, and for a time, offset gravity, but only by special 
machinery and at cost of great outlay of energy. Similarly, 
in the family group, in an army group, and under some other 
conditions, like monopoly or illegal oppression, we can offset 
temporarily the pressure of the law of supply and demand. 
But we can never stray far from it except with very special 
machinery and with great cost to somebody. 

Problems of Vocational Education for Highly Specialized 
Vocations The following are some of the essential con- 
ditions to be included in consideration of problems of voca- 
tional education for the specialized callings : 

1. Many processes will be found for which very young 
or only slightly competent adult workers are adequate, and 
for which a few hours', or at most a few days', special 
vocational training will probably sufiice. In these occu- 
pations juvenile and women workers are apt to predominate. 

2. Opposed to these will be processes which require 
special qualities of bodily strength, maturity, experience, 
judgment, training, technical knowledge. Men engaging in 
the work as a life career will be found more numerous in 
these specialties where requirements are more varied and 
compensation higher. 

3. Some of the more scientific specialties will require 
workers of advanced technical education. In many cases 
these places cannot be filled by promotion from among the 
workers of an industrial establishment, but will seek spe- 
cially prepared workers — engineers, draftsmen, assayers, 
accountants, inspectors, designers — from persons who have 
had specific vocational school training. 

4. On the other hand, many of the advanced positions 



Industrial Education 229 

will require qualities that can probably be most advan- 
tageously found within the establishment itself, among those 
workers who have been adding to their natural physical and 
mental qualifications for such work, the special training or 
technical knowledge required. 

5. In any highly organized establishment a variety of 
forces operate to keep a specialty worker on one type of 
job, except when pressing need exists for workers to fill 
higher places. Only in relatively few cases — like the 
advancement of locomotive fireman to freight locomotive 
engineer, and from freight locomotive engineer to passenger 
locomotive engineer — does there exist a regular and ex- 
pected line of promotion. Hence, if for reasons of individ- 
ual or social efficiency, it seems desirable that workers should 
be encouraged and assisted to seek promotion wherever and 
whenever practicable, special forces of an educational nature 
must be set in motion. 

6. In highly specialized fields of production it will often 
be easily possible to train a worker to perform special types 
of operations of approximately the same difficulty and in- 
volving the same compensation — horizontally specialized 
occupations. It is very probable that the shifting of young 
workers among several of these occupations may prove of 
great importance from the standpoint of growth in body 
and mind. It may yet be demonstrated that shifting from 
one occupation to another will prove of great advantage 
in relieving the monotony of specialized work. 

7. Promotion from inferior to superior occupations now 
prevails in greater or less degree in all occupational fields, 
since it is evident that higher places are filled, and demands 
for service there are only slightly more pressing than below ; 
but that promotion is now badly organized, wasteful, and in- 
effective generally. But no initial vocational education can 
provide for it; that must be met by special schools of basic 
or of extension vocational education designed to be avail- 



230 Vocational Education 

able when the worker shall have reached the approximate 
stage of maturity and experience requisite for the proposed 
advanced stage, and when proper vocational guidance tests 
will have demonstrated his probable qualifications for the 
different or advanced calling. 

8. In many cases promotion will involve simply advance- 
ment to a process related to, but somewhat more exacting, 
than the one previously followed. In such instances the 
possibilities of acquiring suitable training in day continua- 
tion and evening extension schools and classes should always 
be examined. 

9. But when promotion involves shifting to an occupa- 
tion for which the old gives little direct preparation, then 
it is doubtful whether continuation or extension school at- 
tendance will suffice to give the needed preparation. Prob- 
ably short-course schools designed to give basic training, 
followed by part-time wage-earning participation will give 
best results. 



CHAPTER VIII 

VOCATIONAL HOMEMAKING EDUCATION 

The education of women and girls for the homemaking vo- 
cations has evolved only to a point where a number of specific 
problems can be diagnosed. It is the purpose of this chap- 
ter to state a few of these problems, to suggest some methods 
for their further study, and to submit certain tentative pro- 
posals for criticism. As far as practicable, the methods 
employed will be those being developed in educational sociol- 
ogy, namely, to base all proposed aims of education upon an 
analysis and evaluation of those needs of social groups which 
are to be realized in and through education, school and non- 
school. The standards will be those increasingly accepted in 
the general theory of vocational education. The study is de- 
signed primarily for educators engaged in research in the 
fields of homemaking and household arts education, or in 
administering state and national legislation intended to 
promote such education. 

I. Problems for Consideration 

1. Do we possess as yet any definitions of the homemak- 
ing vocations sufficiently specific and concrete to serve as 
foundations for the formulation of satisfactory programs of 
instruction and training for those vocations? Where can 
they be found? (It is obvious that definitions expressed 
only in vague general terms render very poor service.) 

2. Back of definitions of homemaking, do we as yet pos- 
sess analyses and classifications of homes sufficiently con- 

231 



232 Vocational Education 

Crete to enable us to determine what are, for given social 
groups and conditions, optimum degrees of efficiency to be 
expected of homemakers? (For example, the criticism is 
often heard that existing programs of home economics 
education are based on excessively high home maintenance 
standards from the standpoint of those whom they are to 
serve — that they ignore the $900-$ 1200 income class home, 
in spite of its prevalence.) ^ Where can such analyses be 
found ? 

3. Have we as yet any sufficient survey of the effective- 
ness of the non-school vocational education for homemaking 
which now prevails (and always has prevailed, possibly in 
different forms) in various social groups or income levels? 
Where can the results of such surveys be found? (It is 
alleged that programs of basic home economics education 
now take no adequate account of the effectiveness of non- 
school education, and therefore fail to utilize its results, 
cooperatively or as basis of correlation.) What, for speci- 
fied groups or conditions, are the contributions of such edu- 
cation to (a) ideals and appreciations, (b) technical knowl- 
edge, and (c) skills, at age levels, 1-12, 12-15, 15-18 for 
non-wage-earners or school attendants, (d) 15-18 for wage- 
earners or school attendants, (e) 18-22 for home ''board- 
ers," (/) 18-22 for home assistants, and (g) 22-30 for 
young married women, etc. ? 

4. Is it practicable to distinguish in the actual exercise 
of the homemaking vocation by given individuals the fac- 
tors, respectively, of " skills," forms of " related technical 
knowledge," and forms of " related hygienic, social, and 
cultural knowledge (and ideals) " in such a way as to de- 
duce therefrom the best parts which should be played re- 
spectively by home apprenticeship, school education, and 
undirected experience, in the total educative processes of 
producing vocational competency? (Home economics 

1 Incomes and prices herein are supposed to be as of 1914 standards. 



Vocational Homemaking Education 233 

classes and courses have heretofore restricted themselves 
largely to technical instruction; they seem to have done little 
to produce the two classes of skills essential in homemaking 
— manipulative and managerial ; and both their methods and 
results have been freely criticized as '' impractical," *' over- 
technical," "excessively wedded to book and laboratory"). 
Under what conditions can technical instruction alone func- 
tion in vocational competency — (a) as instruction uncon- 
nected with home experience for girls 12-16 under conditions 
of home apprenticeship, (.&) as instruction uncorrelated with 
home experience on part of girls 16-20, (c) as extension 
instruction to housewives? Does Bulletin 28 of the Federal 
Board for Vocational Education definitely provide for 
*' training " ? How can training in " homemaking arts " be 
given? Have we as yet any satisfactory analyses of "train- 
ing" for homemaking at ages 12-14, 14-16, 16-20, before 
marriage, after marriage? 

5. In general, it is agreed that the best time for vocational 
education is just prior to the individual's undertaking " full 
responsibility " work as operative or manager in the voca- 
tion itself. When do the following persons usually under- 
take " full " or " part " responsibility work : farmers' 
daughters not leaving home until married; domestic serv- 
ants; women wage-earners from 16 to 23, then marrying 
and discontinuing outside work; home-staying daughters? 
How far are girls exceptions to above principle by virtue of 
constant living in homes? How far do girls at 14-16 pos- 
sess active motives for entry upon vocational homemaking? 
How far can results of homemaking instruction or training 
keep in "cold storage" (without application), e.g., in 
cases of girls 16-22 working for wages, but living at home? 
How far can " instincts " for homemaking contribute to 
expected proficiencies — along food lines, clothing, sick 
nursing, child care, management? Which of these prob- 
lems have been well investigated? 



234 Vocational Education 

6. To what extent have aims, methods, and administra- 
tive organization of home economics education taken shape 
under hmitations imposed by conditions of other forms of 
education? Why do we think of it chiefly as related to 
ages 14-18 in high schools? As parallel to liberal arts 
courses ? As dependent upon " laboratories " ? As yield- 
ing almost no forms of cooperation with homes? How can 
we provide for investigation of problems of specific aim and 
method on assumption of " optimum " conditions? 

7. What is the "case" method of study? Is it practi- 
cable to procure, within reasonable limits of precision, type 
" cases " of home practice, preparation for home practice, 
needs of preparatory training, present schemes of school 
preparation, and the like, and tentatively to analyze and 
evaluate these? 

8. What are principles of vocational education in general 
which are capable of application in homemaking? 

9. What is the " home project method " of vocational 
homemaking ? 

10. Are the suggestions of Bulletin 28 conclusive? 

11. What is the place of household arts in liberal educa- 
tion? 

II. What Are Homes? 

The " home " is a very much generalized conception. 
Every person can in a measure appreciate, even visualize, a 
home or homes. But we still possess no adequate analysis 
of the essential characteristics and functionings of homes 
of various kinds. Because of the indeterminateness of pre- 
vailing *' job analyses " of homemaking and the hardly less 
vague standards of functioning of the home as a social 
agency, most current proposals and practices toward educa- 
tion for homemaking exhibit endless evidences of arti- 
ficiality and impracticability. 

1. In the most universal sense, the home is obviously a 



Vocational Eomemaking Education 235 

place for the rest and recreation of adults. It is manifestly 
also a workshop for the elaboration of consumable goods — 
foods, clothing, beds, social intercourse, worship, education. 
In its profounder aspects it is a means for the nurture of 
children. These functions are interdependent, interlocked; 
but, for any given type of home, which are more funda- 
mental, more socially essential, than others? We greatly 
need concrete analyses of these problems along the lines of 
the classifications suggested below. 

2. It is, indeed, highly desirable that we should have 
functional analyses of various types of '' homes." In the 
modern world there are many specialized agencies which 
function, temporarily or permanently, as homes for adults 
engaged in vocational pursuits — barracks, cantonments, 
ships, hotels, bachelors' cabins, dormitories, hotels, Pullman 
cars. There are hivelike homes for children more or less 
abnormally situated — asylums, boarding-school dormito- 
ries, institutional cottages. Homes for monogamous families 
also exist in several species, from the hotel apartment and 
housekeeping apartment, the urban '' row " or semi-detached 
house, to the detached urban dwelling, and the farm home- 
stead. 

3. If we assume that, sociologically considered, the pri- 
mary function of the '' home " is to contribute to the rearing 
of children, then the various species of '' family " homes 
should be divided into a number of varieties according to the 
scope of their work and the means wherewith it is to be 
done. The following at least are some of the types that 
require extended analysis (the words ''normal number of 
children " denote expectancy of from four to six children 
by time rnother is at age of forty) : (a) tenement home, no 
servant help; normal number of children; annual income 
less than $800 (1900-1914 prices); (h) same, but income 
$800-$1200; (c) same, except apartment with hot water 
and heat, and income $1200-$2000; (d) same, income 



236 Vocational Education 

$2000-$3000; {e) apartment home, one servant, subnormal 
number of children, income $2500-$4000; (/) same, sub- 
normal number of children (one), no servant, income under 
$1200; {g) apartment, subnormal number of children 
(two), one servant, income $2000-$4000; {h) detached 
urban or suburban house, no servant, normal number of chil- 
dren, income under $1000; (z) same, but subnormal number 
of children, income under $1000; (/) same as {h), but in- 
come $1000-$1500; {k) same, income $1500-$2500; (/) 
same, except one servant, and income $2000-$4000; (m) de- 
tached urban or suburban house, subnormal number of chil- 
dren (one or two), no servant, income $1200-$2000; (w) 
detached house, normal or subnormal number of children, 
three or more servants, income $7000-$20,000 ; (0) de- 
tached farm home, excess number of children, net income 
(money and kind) under $700, colored; (/>) same, white; 
(g) same, white, but net income $750-$ 1100; (r) farm 
home, normal number of children, no servant, net income 
$800-$1000; is) same, net income, $1000-$1500, irregu- 
lar help; {t) farm home, normal number of children, two 
or more servants, income $3000-$ 10,000. 

4, It is also desirable that homes should be classified in 
terms of the ideals or standards toward which they aspire, 
as well as the conditions they must meet. What are the 
" standards of living," or perhaps better, the standards of 
comfort, toward which are striving: (a) The American- 
born manual workingman's family? {h) The American- 
born land-owning general farmer? (c) The American- 
born well-educated professional man or commercial worker? 
{d) The colored tenant farmer in the South? {e) The re- 
cent Italian immigrant, manual laborer in city? Sociologi- 
cal research is needed to define prevailing types, to evalu- 
ate their persistent and their " fluid " ideals. 

5. Of the above types, which are " modal " — that is, 
statistically most numerous — from the standpoint of the 



Vocational Homemaking Education 237 

vocational education of prospective homemakers ? Which 
are most prevalent, or expected to be most prevalent, in 
given communities? Into which types are the girls whose 
abilities and favoring home circumstances enable them to 
" go through " high school likely to fit? Into which types 
are the girls of a manufacturing city, who leave school at 
14-16, likely to fit? What are the types likely to be filled 
by daughters of poor '' renting" farmers? Are we to ex- 
pect the flat or apartment home to replace the detached 
house in cities? in suburbs? Are home economics teachers 
expected to prognosticate the future availability of servant 
help — and for several income classes of homes considered 
separately? The probable extension of the apartment or flat 
type of dwelling? The possible evolution of cooperative 
housekeeping? Development of agencies for the coopera- 
tive or delegated care of small children? Future possibili- 
ties of "boarding" life in nurture of children? Cooper- 
ation of the father, on a short wage-earner's day, in duties 
of twenty-four-hour day homemaking? Probable future 
size of family in different social groups ? 

6. It is suggested that in class work, where not other- 
wise specified, the term " home " should imply these con- 
ditions : detached urban house, no servant, from four to 
six children, $900-$ 1500 income standard, American tra- 
ditions. From this, as a point of departure, variants could 
be described. In many cities the ''cold water" (no heat 
supplied), "walk-up" three-to-five-room flat for working- 
men's families is becoming very common; it means normal 
number of children at least, no servants, income $700-$1000. 
Also the separate land-owner's farm home is very prevalent. 

III. What Is the Vocation of Homemaker? 

Homemaking a Composite Vocation. — It is obvious that 
the vocation of homemaker is composite to an extent char- 



238 Vocational Education 

acteristic of only a very few other occupations. This re- 
mains true, notwithstanding the extent to which certain 
functions have in America been removed from the homes — 
such as weaving, teaching, food preservation, gardening, 
and, now, baking, brewing, and garment-making. Compos- 
iteness of vocation is ordinarily a sign of primitiveness. 
When human beings live under primitive, pioneering, or 
dispersed conditions, there is relatively little subdivision of 
labor and exchange of commodities. Every primitive 
hunter, fisherman, tiller of the soil, warrior, teacher, and 
housewife is in large measure and of necessity a jack-of-all- 
trades. The home retains this character long after it has 
largely disappeared in manufacture, transportation, and com- 
merce, because the family is the most universal unit of con- 
sumption and especially of the productive processes that 
just precede or are intimately associated with consumption. 
Sociologically speaking, we can again affirm that children 
are the cause of the present compositeness of the homemak- 
er's activities. If children could be as effectively reared in 
barracks, hotels, or asylums as adults can live and carry on 
consuming activities in these elaborate organizations of 
specialized service, then we should speedily see the end of 
the highly localized home. 

Organization and specialization of service lead to depth 
of knowledge, refinement of skill, and intricacy of mana- 
gerial relations. The small " general " farmer, the country 
storekeeper, the teacher in a small high school, the village 
mechanic, the country doctor, like the housewife, must 
always experience the trials of realizing themselves less com- 
petent in the special arts, which they must attempt, than the 
specialists. Utopian suggestions that '' homemaking " is (or 
ought to be regarded as) a '' profession " render no service 
in mitigating the hard reality that for the great majority it 
must long continue a composite of ill-defined and imper- 
fectly standardized arts. 



Vocational Homemaking Education 239 

The first step in the process of defining the vocation of 
homemaker is that of segregating for detailed consideration 
some fairly common and constant types of home. The 
second is to analyze, describe, and, perhaps, evaluate the vari- 
ous prevailing forms of skill, knowledge, appreciation, and 
ideal now found among those of the practitioners of this 
type of homemaking who would be judged to be slightly 
above the average by persons possessed of critical and com- 
mon-sense judgment. 

Analysis of Type Homemaking Vocation. — Let us assume 
as the type to be considered homemakers in detached village 
or urban houses, no servants, family budget, $1000-$ 1200 
per year, American ancestry, normal number of children 
(two or three at ages assumed for mothers — 28-34) , moth- 
ers of elementary school general education, no school edu- 
cation in homemaking. Call this type M. Taking one 
hundred of these at random, we can for convenience classify 
twenty as A grade (excellent), thirty as B grade (good), 
thirty as C grade (fair), and twenty as D grade (poor). 
For purposes of determining prevailing requirements of the 
vocation we can confine ourselves to the B grade on the 
assumption that their standards are those we desire the next 
generation, on the average, to approximate, but are also not 
the effects of exceptional heredity. 

The vocational activities of these B grade homemakers 
can readily be classified under such major and minor heads 
as those given in the following table; and a consensus of 
competent critics could assign to these various groups of 
activities, for the type of homemaker under consideration, 
crude measures of their relative importance (weightings) 
along the lines tentatively suggested by the figures here ar- 
bitrarily assigned (it is assumed that total optimum com- 
petency would be rated at 10,000 units; and that optimum 
competency in any one division would be rated as given; 
and that individual MBx might be rated as shown) : 



240 Vocational Education 

TABLE I 

Classification and Rating of Activities of Type M Homemaker 

Optimum Rating of 

Activity Group (Majors) Standards Individual 

for Type M MBx 

1. Foods (buying, preparation, serving) . , . 3000 2000 

2. Clothing (buying, upkeep, making) ... 1500 1200 

3. Household care and upkeep (beds, clean- 

ing, etc.) 1000 900 

4. Laundry 500 400 

5. Care of children 3000 1500 

Activity Group {Minors) 

6. Accounting 300 10 

7. Sick nursing 300 250 

8. Housing and furnishing 100 SO 

9. Adult sociability 150 150 

10. Garden and yard 150 100 

Detailed Analysis Required. — But it is clear that such an 
analysis as that given above is too crude and general to serve 
for practical guidance. For one thing, it makes no distinc- 
tions between skills and related technical (or artistic and 
scientific) knowledge. Some homemakers are strong in 
certain skills acquired purely on the basis of imitation and 
"trial and success" methods under competent direction; 
and weak in technical knowledge. Some have excellent 
technical knowledge but inferior skills. Possibly a third 
type of power (or appreciation) should also be distin- 
guished, namely, social insight, or, more adequately, physi- 
cal, social, and cultural insight. It is also probable that dis- 
tinctions should be made between manipulative and mana- 
gerial skills. 

Furthermore, any adequate analysis must distinguish, 
weight, and evaluate numerous concrete subdivisions in the 
above scheme. '' Skills " in preparing foods are not gen- 
eral, but often very concrete and specific. Skill in bread- 
making may coexist with lack of it in beefsteak broiling. 



Vocational Homemaking Education 241 

Competency in making certain articles of clothing may be 
found together with low ideals of upkeep. 

Let it be repeated that the first object of the analysis and 
evaluation suggested above is to ascertain what powers and 
capacities are now prevailingly found among homemakers 
of slightly more than average ability as found in a certain 
type or class. Such analysis should normally precede at- 
tempts to determine what powers and capacities the next 
generation of homemakers of similar groups should possess 
as a result of purposive vocational education. In much of 
current literature on the aims of home economics confusion 
exists because aspirations are not presented separately from 
diagnoses of existing conditions; and also because in diag- 
noses various types and grades of homemakers are jumbled. 
The problem of vocational education for the girl or woman 
who in all probability will direct the labor of two or more 
servants will undoubtedly be found to be different in many 
essential respects from that of the girl or woman who is al- 
most certainly destined to carry the full load of homemaking 
by herself. No less important at certain points are dis- 
tinctions between rural and urban homes, and between 
homes in apartments and homes in detached or semi-de- 
tached houses. Scientific study is certain to reveal other 
classifications of importance, based, perhaps, upon climati ■, 
occupational, and other considerations. 

IV. Sociological Scope and Standards of the 
Homemaking Vocations 

1. There are in the United States some 16,000,000 women, 
chiefly married and widowed, whose principal vocation 
is homemaking. Of these probably 90 per cent are unable 
to divide work or responsibility with co-laborers ; hence they 
must carry on all phases of homemaking work by themselves 
— conspicuously the procuring, preparing, and serving of 

R 



242 Vocational Education 

food, the making and upkeep of clothing, laundry work, 
house care, care of children, etc. For women of this class, 
homemaking, therefore, at least among white people, pre- 
sents relatively few variable features, as between East and 
West, North and South. Hence, homemaking is the most 
numerously followed of all vocations. Next to it, in point 
of numbers, is *' farming." But " farming " includes many 
very unlike vocations, from cranberry, orange, asparagus, 
cotton or sheep growing as specialties to dairy, grain, mar- 
ket-garden, or '' general " farming. 

Domestic service for hire, or favor — specialized and un- 
specialized — may be classified here as " assistant home- 
making." 

2. From the standpoint of the sociologist the central 
fact in homemaking is the rearing of children. The monog- 
amous marriage and the home have evolved side by side, 
most conspicuously in the north temperate zone, probably in 
chief measure because of their suitability to the rearing of 
the children — to the making out of the children the kind of 
men and women who could best cooperate in producing and 
sustaining the valuable elements in civilization. All adults 
must, of course, have places of temporary or permanent 
abode; but the beginnings of the most realistic home are laid 
when a man and a woman form a partnership in marriage 
and soon face their responsibility of rearing through their 
" prolonged infancy " the children born of the union. 

3. Endless conventions, customs, and laws have been 
evolved to perpetuate and to improve the home as a social 
institution. Most conspicuous is the division of labor be- 
tween husband and wife. The prevailing American stand- 
ard, which expresses in fullest development the standards 
aspired to in other countries, requires that the husband shall 
be the *' money getter " of the family — that he shall pro- 
duce the marketable goods (or services) wherewith goods 
for the home can be purchased. The wife is expected to do 



Vocational Homemaking Education 243 

the " elaborative " or preparatory work required in the home 
to make goods purchased in more or less raw form suitable 
for immediate consumption. To the mother falls the pro- 
longed and sustaining care of children, especially when 
small. To the father falls induction of boys, as they mature, 
into productive service. To the mother falls the vocational 
'' by-education " of the girls. 

a. Space need not be taken here to elaborate the biologi- 
cal concomitants of these sex differentiations of work, at- 
titude, and responsibility. Doubtless the respective " na- 
tures " of men and women have become somewhat biologi- 
cally differentiated toward the best rearing, as well as toward 
the best begetting and bearing of children. On the other 
hand, many apparently deeply rooted differentiations are 
founded only in social inheritances of customs, conven- 
tions, and other " social " habits and traditions. These last 
can, obviously, be much more readily changed than the 
former. 

h. A secondary function of the home is to reinforce and 
develop personality and community of interest in the adult 
members of the family group. For these it gives a place of 
rest and some forms of recreation, protection from inva- 
sion of weather, and privacy for the social intercourse valu- 
able to the family group. 

4. From the sociological standpoint, therefore, the pri- 
mary standards of good homemaking are to be found, first 
in the children brought to approvable manhood and woman- 
hood through this agency ; and, second, through the enrich- 
ment of personality (health, sociability, culture) accom- 
plished for its adult members. 

a. It is obvious, of course, that each age brings new con- 
ditions to assist or restrict the home in the discharge of its 
social obligations. Schools take over certain functions; 
adults resort to clubs for sociability and other recreation; 
the man's workshop is removed to a distance, so that he 



244 Vocational Education 

loses contact with adolescent boys; many productive opera- 
tions that once gave variety to the work of the wife and op- 
portunities to share work with children are being removed 
from the home. 

V. The " Total Problem " of Vocational 
Education for Homemaking 

One great mistake has frequently been made in construct- 
ing programs or curricula of vocational education in that 
teachers and administrators have proceeded to work with 
existing limitations always in mind from the outset. This 
procedure is fundamentally unscientific. Programs and cur- 
ricula should first be worked out on the assumption of opti- 
mum conditions ; then revisions, corrections, reductions, and 
other accommodations should be made with reference to 
known and defined limitations or other modifying condi- 
tions. 

For example : Assume the problem before us is that of 
providing vocational homemaking education for certain 
women who are usually factory hands from fifteen years of 
age to marriage, who commonly marry at from 22 to 25, 
whose family income from marriage to forty-five will range 
from $1000 to $1500 (the mother not being a wage-earner), 
who will rear from four to six children, and who will live in 
small urban or suburban houses. It is desired that this 
homemaking education shall function in reasonably imme- 
diate competency when first children are born. Let us as- 
sume that we are working in a manufacturing city with large 
numbers of recent immigrants. 

We know that the actual situations confronting us are 
endlessly varied. Some of the girls go to work at fourteen, 
having finished only the fifth grade; others leave after going 
halfway through high school. Some at fifteen have been 
well trained in home craft by their mothers, some possess 



Vocational Homemaking Education 245 

little or no skill. Some have been wise " little mothers " 
and know much about the care of babies, even at twelve 
years of age; but most of them will have learned nothing of 
child care by the time their own first baby arrives. Some 
of them will approach marriage with considerable appreci- 
ation of the responsibilities of homemaking, others will rush 
in heedlessly. If a good day vocational school of home- 
making were available, a few of them would stop work and 
attend it for one or three months in preparation for their 
new vocation; but most of them would not. If well adver- 
tised evening classes in " short units " of homemaking were 
available, many girls would come for some months, but their 
interest would center chiefly in making articles of personal 
wear or adornment, or in cooking dishes suitable for " par- 
ties"; but a few would do genuinely productive work in 
evening classes. 

Confronted by this heterogeneous and confused situation, 
how shall we proceed to devise curricula? Efficient pro- 
cedure certainly requires that we first determine and docu- 
ment in detail curricula and programs on the assumption of 
clear-cut and optimum conditions. 

1. We can assume as basal these factors: (a) All the 
girls and women we are to deal with are wage-earners from 
14—17 to 21-25. {h) All will marry, and have famihes. 
(c) All will be wives of workingmen, having family in- 
comes of $900-$1500. {d) It is desirable that all families 
shall live in accordance with '* good " American standards. 

2. For the purposes of getting our " total " or *' com- 
plete" curriculum defined we can assume the existence of 
these conditions : {a) Women engaged to be married and 
eager to qualify for the vocation of homemaking. {h) 
The prior experience or home training of these women is 
so slight and ineffective as to be negligible. (<:)The woman 
free to give three or six months as may be required to " full 
time " (eight hours daily) for this vocational education. 



246 Vocational Education 

(d) The woman living with her parents in a small home 
which can be used in any and all ways as a *' productive 
shop " for educational practice in homemaking. (e) The 
woman living in the midst of neighbors among whom she 
can find opportunities to care for sick or to assume charge 
of infants when work of this character becomes essential to 
her program. (/) The school so staffed and equipped as to 
give all needed individual instruction, supervision of home 
projects, laboratory work, related reading, etc. 

In the light of these conditions we produce curricula, pro- 
grams, courses, projects, etc., having paid due regard to the 
various kinds of educational products to be produced — 
skills, applicable knowledge, ideals, managerial abilities, ap- 
preciations, etc. Overzealous or " theoretical " teachers 
might well consider warnings and queries at this point: (a) 
We are not expected to train these young women for a " pro- 
fession." (b) In view of the multiplicity of operations 
involved in homemaking, we are not expected to train these 
young women to be as good cooks as hotel chefs, as good 
nurses as hospital graduates, as good seamstresses as those 
working for wages, or as good teachers of little children as 
kindergartners. Overambitious standards or ideals here de- 
feat their own aims, (c) What additions to their powers 
and capacities can we expect these people to make during, 
say, the first five years of married life, as the burdens of 
homemaking rapidly increase? (d) Remember, always, 
that technical knowledge not built on experience is apt to 
be a useless possession, whereas skill, even if unaccompanied 
by technical know^ledge, has a large place in the world. The 
ideal, of course, is skills, manual and managerial, illumined 
by technical knowledge and social insight. 

3. Having made our curricula and programs for the sit- 
uation described above, we can then proceed to make adapta- 
tions and adjustments of them for situations like these : 

a. Where young women have had a substantial appren- 
ticeship in their own homes. 



Vocational Homemaking Education 247 

h. Where it is not practicable to reach young women, but 
it is practicable to provide two to six hours weekly of train- 
ing and instruction in regular public schools during ages 12 
to 15 or 16. 

c. Where young women are eager for homemaking edu- 
cation, but home facilities for training are unavailable. 

d. Where no school facilities are available and teachers 
must do all work in the homes of the girls. 

e. Where women can or will take training only after 
marriage, but where their own homes can then be exten- 
sively used for that purpose. 

VI. The '' Case Method " of Study 

Probably the most profitable methods of approach to the 
problems here under consideration from the standpoint of 
the determination of desirable objectives of vocational 
homemaking education are to be found in the provision of 
curricula and programs for typical '' case " situations, as 
illustrated below : 

^case a 

A woman, 22 years of age, expecting to be married, 
wishes six months' full-time training in homemaking. She 
has been an industrial wage-worker for seven years and 
knows nothing on the " doing " side about homemaking. 
She cannot cook, set a table, make a bed, or patch a dress. 
She has had no experience in handling babies, entertaining 
small children, caring for the sick, buying furniture, or 
keeping household accounts. As a " boarder " or consumer 
in her own home she has the usual " appreciations " of good 
cooking, well-kept rooms, etc. 

Assume that at 30 she is to have three children, that she 
will have a five-room house, in a suburban or village com- 
munity, and that the family income will be $1200 annually. 



248 Vocational Education 

Assume that after marriage she will have to rely largely on 
herself (not having a mother or other elder person living 
with her), and that she is ambitious to start married life 
as a good worker in her new vocation as homemaker. 

Assume also the availabiHty of sufficient means to give her 
a good vocational education — a home as a workshop to 
meet requirements for prepared food, patched clothing, care 
of babies, on a strictly productive (as opposed to " exer- 
cise") basis, as well as books, laboratory facihties, etc. 

Problems to be Solved 

Problem 1. What should be the specific aims of the six 
months' vocational education to be provided ? 

Problem 2. What amounts of available time (assume 
150 working days of eight hours each) should be given re- 
spectively to : 

Majors 

a. Foods: selection and purchase, preparation, serving, 
disposal, re-use, dishwashing, etc. 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 

(b) Related technical studies. 

(c) Related social studies. 

b. Clothing: selection, purchase, making, re-making, re- 
pairs, upkeep. 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 

(b) Related technical studies. 

(c) Related social studies. 

c. Care of house : bed-making, sweeping, keeping articles 
in order; cleansing furniture, wood, glass, stoves, bathroom 
fixtures, etc.; making minor repairs to lights, plumbing, 
locks, etc. 



Vocational Homemaking Education 249 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 
{h) Related technical knowledge, 
(c) Related social knowledge. 

d. Laundry, including ironing, etc. 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 
{h) Related technical knowledge. 
{c^ Related social knowledge. 

e. Children, including sociability and by-education. 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 
{h) Related technical knowledge, 
(c) Related social knowledge. 

Minors 

f. Household accounting, including especially, planning 
of expenditures, budget making, use of inventories, segre- 
gation of expenditures, investment of savings, etc.^ 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 

(b) Related technical knowledge. 

(c) Related social knowledge. 

g. Housing and furniture : selection, fundamental or 
long-period readjustments and renovation (not included 
under " care of house "). 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 

(b) Related technical knowledge. 

(c) Related social knowledge. 

h. Care of sick. 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 

(b) Related technical knowledge. 

(c) Related social knowledge. 

1 For some types of homes, and perhaps eventually for all, this should 
be a major. 



250 Vocational Education 

i. Adult sociability and social culture (excluding socia- 
bility with children). 

(a) Skills, practical performance. 
(&) Related technical knowledge, 
(c) Related social knowledge. 

y. Yard and garden. 

{a) Skills, practical performance. 
{h) Related technical knowledge, 
(c) Related social knowledge. 

Problem 3. What order of presentation of the above 
subjects should be followed? 

Problem 4. In each case what provision should be made 
for training in practical skills ? 

Problem 5. How should related technical knowledge be 
given, and in what relation to practice on productive, useful, 
skill-forming work ? 

Problem 6. Should " practical " exercises (non-produc- 
tive) be accepted in lieu of productive work? 

Problem 7. How should related social knowledge be 
given ? 

Problem 8. What tests of final competency in each case 
should be provided? 

CASE B 

Identical with Case A, except that the total time available 
for training for vocation is three months, or seventy-five 
working days, of eight hours each. 

CASE c 

Identical with Case A, except that women must continue 
wage-earning, and can give only four (evening) hours 
weekly for sixty weeks, divided between two years. 



Vocational Homemaking Education 251 



CASE D 



Identical with Case A, except that women can give only 
time after she is married and living in her own home. Can 
then give six afternoon hours in school and twenty-four (or 
more if necessary) hours to productive work in her own 
home, weekly, for sixteen weeks. Assume teachers with 
ample time for visiting and supervision of home work. 



CASE E 

Farmer's daughter, 22 years old, eighth-grade education. 
Has always helped in farm home and can perform all or- 
dinary operations with the moderate efficiency produced by 
home apprenticeship, including care of small children. Has 
little technical knowledge or social insight relative to the 
homemaking vocation. 

Expects to get married within a year, to have a farm 
house (northern Mississippi Valley), with cash budget of 
$600 yearly and income in *' kind " (owned house, water, 
wood, vegetables, fruit, milk) equivalent to $250. As- 
sume three children at age of thirty and only occasional 
household help. 

Assume possibilities of her attending full time for three 
months a vocational school of homemaking distant 100 miles 
from her home. Assum-C this school to possess all reason- 
able equipment and teaching force required to carry into 
effect such programs as it might decide to be desirable for 
students of the class of Case E. 

Problem 1. What would such a school establish as its 
standards of vocational proficiency for such a woman? 
Classify objectives separately under the categories given for 
Case A, distinguishing under each between practical skill, 
related technical knowledge and related social insight. 

Problem 2. How will the school test and evaluate the 



252 Vocational Education 

powers and capacities in homemaking possessed by the 
woman at entrance? How will it correlate these with the 
new powers and capacities it will seek to produce? 

Problem 3. What will such a school seek to offer as 
training and instruction under each of the categories given 
in Case A? Or, what will be its programs of instruction? 

Problem 4. What will such a school provide in the way 
of facihties for practice? In foods? Laundry? Child 
care? Sick care? Housing? 

Problem 5. How will such a school avoid stressing ur- 
ban conditions ? How can it keep solidly in touch with ru- 
ral conditions? 

CASE F 

Identical with Case E, except that the woman has gone 
to high school and normal school and has taught two years, 
as a consequence of which her skills and technical knowledge 
of homemaking at the outset are negligible, while her appre- 
ciations are normal. 

CASE G 

Identical with Case E, except that the woman can give 
three hours daily to the homemaking school, located one 
hour away, and the remainder to her mother's home, where 
productive educational work can be done. 

VII. Some General Principles 

In the framing and passage of the Smith-Hughes Act, 
granting national aid to certain forms of vocational educa- 
tion, home economics was included at the eleventh hour. 
A distinguished member of the Federal Board for Voca- 
tional Education has publicly asserted that the home eco- 
nomics provision was a " monkey-wrench thrown into other- 
wise perfectly good machinery." Many teachers of home 



Vocational Homemaking Education 253 

economics in elementar}^ and especially in secondary schools 
who were serenely pursuing the even tenor of their way be- 
fore the enactment of the Smith-Hughes law now find also 
that that law is playing the disastrous part of monkey-wrench 
in their heretofore smooth-running machinery. 

What is the vocational education that prepares for home- 
making or the work of housewife? Under what conditions 
is home economics " vocational " ? What else can the sub- 
ject be, if not vocational? These, and many other similar 
questions are disconcerting, if not haunting, many of our 
home economics teachers to-day. They are destined to put 
to the test not a few of current traditions as to aims and 
methods of education in fields only distantly related to the 
homemaking vocation. They show the utter inadequacy 
of some current interpretations of educational values made 
by men of strong academic prepossessions. 

The immediate difiiculties confronting home economics 
teachers arise from a few simple but more or less conflicting 
conditions: (a) Congress enacted the Smith-Hughes law 
to aid vocational education, and only vocational education. 
{h) The public has all along believed that the home econom- 
ics courses which had become so generally established in 
progressive school systems were vocational in intent and re- 
sults. ' Hence the public has insisted that schools maintain- 
ing these courses should proceed to claim their due share of 
'' Smith-Hughes " money, (c ) The administering author- 
ities have in some cases denied that home economics courses 
as ordinarily found are in fact vocational, and have insisted 
on new and sometimes difficult modifications. 

Now, it is well known that many differences of mind in 
this imperfect world are due to failures to define terms and 
standards. How far is this the situation here? On the 
other hand, sore contests always arise when progressive 
action is being taken, the very nature of which necessitates 
discarding of famihar habits, and readjustment of stand- 



254 Vocational Education 

ards. The authorities charged with the enforcement of the 
law claim that such is often the case here. 

The history of the evolution of vocational education 
shows how present confusion in almost all fields of voca- 
tional education arises under both the conditions stated 
above. A few basic inquiries will make this clear. What 
does " vocational education " mean ? Does it include all 
those forms of experience, instruction, and training, in 
school and out of school, which, superadded to the individ- 
ual's native endowment, finally give him that which we rec- 
ognize as vocational competency ? Then it will be admitted 
that, in the sense used, every one, substantially, for thou- 
sands of years, has received a vocational education — good, 
bad, or indifferent, complete or incomplete, wasteful or eco- 
nomical, as the case may be. In that sense, then, every 
housewife and every domestic servant in the United States 
to-day has received some vocational education, although few 
have received any part of that education through an agency 
which could properly be called a school. 

We are now on educational bedrock. When and why do 
we seek to establish schools for vocational education to sup- 
plement or replace the other agencies? Only when these 
other agencies are insufficient to the needs of the time and 
when a type of school is invented that can give the edu- 
cation. That has been the history of vocational schools of 
war leadership, medicine, priesthood, pharmacy, navigation, 
law, civil engineering, stenography, telephone switchboard 
operating, nursing, and elementary school teaching. It will 
probably be the history of schools of journalism, acting, in- 
door salesmanship, waiting on table, poultry farming, house 
carpentry, school nursing, automobile repair, homemaking, 
and engine firing. (It can hardly be said that we have vo- 
cational schools for this second group of vocations as yet; 
current attempts are hardly beyond the experimental stage. ) 

Do vocational schools at first undertake to give complete 



Vocational Homemaking Education 255 

competency for a given vocation — complete, that is, as 
reasonably practicable for the age at which graduation is 
expected? Rarely ever. Sometimes they assume a pre- 
vious period of apprenticeship — as did earHer schools of 
law, medicine, engineering, and teaching (under the pupil- 
teacher system in England). Sometimes they have counted 
upon what is in effect an apprenticeship subsequent to 
schoohng — as do present-day schools of law, medicine, 
stenography, and engineering. Sometimes, however, they 
have paralleled practice and study in order to dispense with 
prior and subsequent apprenticeship, as do present-day 
schools of nursing and elementary school-teaching and as 
some engineering, trade, and farming schools are endeavor- 
ing to do. 

It is now good usage to call that kind of vocational edu- 
cation in schools which presupposes previous or concurrent 
practice of an occupation, extension teaching; all that in- 
struction in the art, science, mathematics, and language of a 
vocation which anticipates or precedes practice of a vocation, 
technical instruction; and all that vocational education which 
undertakes to teach practical skill and related technical and 
social knowledge in close correlation as basic vocational ed- 
ucation. (But technical instruction not directed towards, 
and usually functioning in, vocational practice cannot prop- 
erly be called vocational education.) 

In discussing standards for vocational education let us 
frankly recognize that many professional schools, notwith- 
standing the years of history behind them, are far from hav- 
ing yet determined, with any useful degree of precision, 
either their aims or the validity of their means and methods. 
Even the best engineering schools are to-day only higher 
technical schools, although some are now attempting, 
through summer practice, to give a certain amount of skill 
and managerial ability. In general, their faculties still sat- 
isfy themselves with the easy assumption that practical skill 



256 Vocational Education 

and managerial powers are things that must be learned in 
" the school of experience " — with all the wastefulness 
and maladjustment which that involves. Most varieties of 
commercial education are still on an essentially technical 
basis — they do not prepare for a given vocation, but only 
give the instruction supposed to be useful to one beginning 
what will be practically an apprenticeship in the practice of 
the vocation. The one substantial exception is stenography 
and typewriting — here the candidate is, in the best schools, 
actually prepared to begin at once the commercial practice 
of her vocation. 

Probably the most disputed question in recent and con- 
temporary movements for the extension of vocational pro- 
ficiency in various callings has been the value of technical 
instruction in advance of practice. Long before we had basic 
vocational schools for such occupations as machine-shop 
practice, electricity, printing, carpentry, homemaking and 
farming, our technical high schools had developed courses 
of technical instruction in, or somewhat related to, these call- 
ings. But practical men have always been very skeptical of 
the results of such courses. It is true that these schools can 
easily be administered so that they will select the most prom- 
ising candidates for the respective occupations. A little 
judicious advertising and testing of entrants will accomplish 
that purpose. Having selected personalities that are certain 
to attain success in their callings in any event, it is easy and 
natural, reasoning post hoc ergo propter hoc, to attribute 
the success of these students to the instruction they re- 
ceived in school. During recent years a classic example of 
this kind has been given very wide publicity. A certain 
technical high school collected data which showed that boys 
leaving school at fourteen and commencing work at, say five 
dollars per week, will have been advanced to the point where 
at thirty years of age they will be earning, say, fifteen dol- 
lars per week; whereas graduates of the technical high 



'^ 



Vocational Homemaking Education 257 

school, possibly starting at the age of eighteen at only five 
or six dollars per week, will be earning twenty-five to thirty 
dollars per week at the age of thirty. Now, admitting the 
facts, they, of course, prove nothing as to the value of tech- 
nical high school instruction and training. Every observer 
of schools knows that only very high-grade boys enter tech- 
nical high schools; that of these only the best survive the 
first year or two; and that the graduates are a very picked 
lot, and destined to success in life, schooling or no schooling. 

Among all well-informed educators the conclusion is now 
generally held that for a large majority of callings technical 
instruction in advance of practical applications — which usu- 
ally means applications in productive work and under com- 
mercial conditions — is almost valueless, and sometimes de- 
cidedly harmful. It is obvious that electrical engineering 
offers a relatively large volume of technical knowledge. A 
person of exceptional capacity for abstract thinking can 
spend several years in mastering this knowledge — as or- 
ganized in mathematics, mechanics, chemistry, engineering 
theory, etc. Then he can begin practice, and apply his 
knowledge as he finds occasion. But every man familiar 
with the conditions of higher education is aware that only 
from one to three per cent of persons between eighteen and 
thirty years of age are able to develop the powers required, 
according to current standards, of electrical engineers. 

In pattern-making, on the other hand, skill bulks large and 
technical knowledge small. The men who ordinarily enter 
pattern-making are usually strong in " mechanical instincts " 
and not so strong in those powers of abstract thinking which 
are exemplified in the study of mathematics. Every educa- 
tor knows that appeals to common experience will help us 
here. We should hardly expect a person to profit greatly 
from several months' instruction in the theory or technique 
of swimming before he enters the water. The writer once 
saw an advertisement, " Horseback-riding taught by mail,'.' 



258 Vocational Education 

but he retained the hope that the recipient of these lessons 
had a horse to practice on while learning. In training a 
man to be a barber or a girl to be a waitress, it is apparent 
that only a very little advance technical knowledge could be 
given with profit. 

In analyzing scores of occupations from this standpoint, 
it is apparent that two types of considerations are involved, 
(a) What, in any given vocation, are the relative values of 
skill and managerial abilities on the one hand, and what we 
call related technical knowledge, on the other? (b) What 
are the various learning capacities of those who are likely to 
enter such vocation ? 

VIII. Applications of These General Principles 

TO HOMEMAKING EDUCATION 

It can be readily understood from the foregoing discus- 
sion what have been some of the obstacles encountered in 
various endeavors to develop vocational homemaking edu- 
cation. In earlier stages, when technical knowledge was 
imperfectly developed, only the practical arts were taught — 
cooking, sewing, bedmaking, etc. Often, of course, these 
subjects, as taught in schools, were very superficial and arti- 
ficial. Then came the enormous development of technical 
knowledge, especially in the departments of foods, house- 
hold accounting and household management. Under the 
head of " domestic art " similar developments of technical 
knowledge in departments of clothing, housing, etc., were 
attempted, but with less success. 

A second stage of evolution in homemaking education 
came when, under the collective name of " home economics," 
courses based on the productive activities of the home as- 
sumed a largely technical character — it must be remem- 
bered that laboratory work, experimentation, and practical 
exercises are integral parts usually of technical instruction, 
since, almost never, are they designed to produce basic skills. 



Vocational Homemaking Education 259 

Hence the general demand of competent critics to-day that 
home economics education, seeking to meet requirements of 
vocational education for homemaking shall : (a) provide for 
the necessary practical experience in productive work re- 
quired to produce enduring skills, manual and managerial, if 
it is to be regarded as basic vocational education; or else {h) 
connect positively and purposefully with previous practical 
experience if it is to be regarded as extension vocational edu- 
cation. 

It is denied that vocational competency in homemaking as 
that is found now in millions of American homes, and as it 
is desired on behalf of millions more in the future, can be 
more than slightly produced by technical instruction alone, 
even if that include laboratory and amateur productive ex- 
ercises. 

It is recognized that some home economics departments 
take charge of school lunches. This is good productive 
practice as far as it goes, even if on excessively large scale 
for home food preparation, but what schools cover the vari- 
ous fields of foods, clothing, house care, child care, laundry, 
etc., in this practical way? 

IX. The *' Project Method " of Teaching 
Homemaking 

1. In the total process of producing homemaking compe- 
tency to function in adult life, we should recognize several 
distinct stages or even different areas of possible operation. 
For example : 

a. In girlhood, from six to twelve, it is obviously possible 
for the mother or for a teacher who can control conditions of 
cime, motive, and familiar implements as can the mother, 
to train the girl in various specific skills — tea-making, dust- 
ing, outing care of infant, darning — and to attach to these 
and related operations, appropriate technical knowledge, ap- 
preciations, aspirations, and ideals. 



26o Vocational Education 

h. From ten to sixteen, at least during the time of transi- 
tions from play motives, interests, and powers to work mo- 
tives, interests, and powers, it is clearly practicable in the 
case of a large proportion of girls, to elicit fairly strong in- 
terests in amateur homemaking — when the desires and mo- 
tives are for results functioning as in the adult world of 
work, but the appreciations and powers are still those of the 
play stage and spirit, unwilling to tolerate long routines, to 
search for technical knowledge, to undergo drill or training. 

In many cases this would seem to be an appropriate time 
for rich offering of household arts as general education. 
Appreciations, insights, aspirations, even ideals, can easily 
be formed in relation to novel situations in homemaking, 
where familiarity with, and enforced drudgery in, domestic 
operations has not bred the blase attitude or even contempt. 
But teachers should be careful not to confuse the results of 
this general education with those to be derived from effective 
vocational education. 

c. From fifteen to eighteen would seem to be an appro- 
priate time for offerings of basic or extension vocational 
homemaking to girls who could see clearly ahead of them 
wage-earning employment as assistant homemakers, as 
trained employees in the homes of their mothers or others. 
For the present, of course, little can be done here because 
popular valuations of the vocations of '' domestic service " 
are so adverse that self-respecting and ambitious girls seek 
non-domestic vocations by preference. 

d. For young women from eighteen to twenty-five, who 
expect to become independent homemakers, there exist large 
opportunities for: (a) extension vocational education for 
those who, like many farmers' daughters, have already had 
extensive basic experience in a large variety of homemaking 
operations; and (6) basic vocational education for those 
who, like a large majority of factory and office employees, 
have had almost negligibly small experience in, or even con- 



Vocational Homemaking Education 261 

tact with, domestic operations. Motives may be strongest 
just before or soon after marriage. 

e. Other stages or areas could easily be defined, espe- 
cially by taking account of different social classes. 

2. The '' project " is, from many points of view, the best 
educational device for basic vocational education. It has 
not yet been tried extensively in homemaking. Its best de- 
velopments are found in agricultural education. As ap- 
plied to vocational education, the project is a " job " or 
unit of productive work, usually of a utilizable or even mar- 
ketable character, selected and organized as constituting a 
valuable stage in an educational process. 

3. Homemaking projects illustrated : 

a. A girl or woman of no previous experience undertakes 
to make ten shirtwaists of exactly the same pattern and ma- 
terial. From the making of the first she gets a large amount 
of new experience, accompanied by a certain amount of 
technical knowledge, appreciation, etc. In making the re- 
mainder she increases her skill, organization of effort, etc. 
Parallel with her work, she can be helped to insight, as to 
social, hygienic, and other general aspects of her work. If, 
after the making of ten shirtwaists, further increments of 
perm.anent skill or of applicable technical knowledge should 
be small, then the educational value of the project has largely 
been realized. Further making of shirtwaists would be val- 
uable for production rather than education. 

b. An inexperienced girl, directed by a competent teacher, 
gives three hours daily for a month to providing the break- 
fasts of a family of six. Linked up with the actual prep- 
aration of the food and washing of the dishes, will be such 
technical matters as planning variations in menus, selecting 
and buying materials, keeping suitable accounts. Related 
studies of nutrition, markets, technical processes, etc., can 
easily be linked up to, and interpreted by, this project by the 
teacher through lectures, readings, problems, etc. 



262 Vocational Education 

4. Scores of other suitable projects, large and small, 
can be devised. Care of the outing hours of an infant for 
two weeks; care of a bed-chamber for two weeks; perform- 
ance of family washing for four weeks ; washing and dress- 
ing of a child or infant for two weeks ; baking family bread 
for a month; canning four dozen jars of plums; preparation 
of five successive Sunday dinners ; keeping the accounts of a 
family for six months on basis of " slips " supplied by the 
family; keeping clothing of three children in repair for three 
months, etc. For service in schools, these projects should be 
analyzed in detail, reference readings specifically indicated, 
and related technical and social studies analyzed in detail. 

5. Where the previous practical experience of the student 
justifies the offering of extension rather than basic voca- 
tional courses, there may be less place for projects, and rela- 
tively more for topics of study, collection of materials and 
reports, problems for analysis, laboratory exercises, inves- 
tigations, etc. 

a. For example, a farmer's daughter, age twenty, coming 
to a short-course, full-time school, who has had much expe- 
rience with her mother (frequently supplementing her), may 
be most in need of technical knowledge which she can relate 
to her already well-assimilated experience. She may most 
need explanations of the processes she has learned by imi- 
tation or rule of thumb methods, including improved pro- 
cesses, accounting, etc. 

h. Where home economics is taught as one subject in a 
curriculum of general education — being paralleled by 
courses in English, mathematics, physics, etc., it might be 
possible to give the home economics a vocational flavor by of- 
fering it, in the case of pupils of known home opportunities, 
as extension instruction; but the difficulties are great, and 
the method is seldom used. 

c. The " project " is often confused with an '' exercise " 
or even with a " demonstration." For the sake of explicit- 



Vocational Homemaking Education 263 

ness it would seem best to confine the term to a unit of work 
which combines productive and educative possibihties, and 
possessing possibihties of repeated performance so as to give 
skills. 

6. Problems of Project Method : 

a. What should be the "magnitude "of a project? This is 
partly dependentontheexternalcharacter of the work, partly 
on the psychology of learners. Young learners need smaller 
and shorter time projects than older. Every project should 
take the learner beyond the play stage of experience into the 
work stage. Short, fragmentary experiences, even in fields 
of drudgery, may, by novelty, sustain play interest for a 
time. For girls, twelve to sixteen, it is surmised that valu- 
able projects should require from ten to fifty hours, no 
period of application being less than two, and preferably 
four to six hours. For young women, projects may re- 
quire twenty to sixty hours, optimum single periods of appli- 
cation (in productive work and related study) being four 
hours. 

h. What should be the '' compositeness " or " complex- 
ity " of projects? For best learning purposes, probably, a 
project should center in one natural or normal " strand " or 
field of activity. Within one day, a housewife dresses chil- 
dren, prepares meals, makes beds, etc. But a learner can 
probably make best progress by focusing effort on one or 
two of these series of recurrent jobs, so as to attend to ac- 
quisition of skills, interpretations, etc. On the other hand, 
the related minor jobs normally belonging to a major job 
should be included in the project. A cooking project not 
involving related cleaning up ; a laundry project not involv- 
ing subsequent ironing; a breakfast project not involving 
buying and accounting — these would probably be unwisely 
broken. 

c. How can related technical knowledge and social in- 
sight be integrated to the project? Eventually we shall 



264 Vocational Education 

probably have hundreds of projects given in detail in book- 
lets, with references to related readings, etc. For the pres- 
ent the teacher should seek to build about each project a 
series of readings, technical and social. 

d. Should cooperative projects be provided? Occasion- 
ally, but not to an extent which will prevent fullest acquisi- 
tion of individual powers (of execution) and capacities (for 
appreciation). Cooperative sociability projects are espe- 
cially good — giving a reception or entertainment, relieving 
a poor family. Probably also certain projects necessarily of 
an " observation and report " character — planning the loca- 
tion of a farmhouse, furnishing a kitchen, etc., could be of a 
cooperative character. 

X. Federal Board's Bulletin No. 28 (1919) 

(Organisation and Administration of Home Economics 

Education) 

This bulletin " may be considered as an official answer to 
the many inquiries concerning matters of policy in home 
economics education received by the office of the Federal 
Board." 

In general, the definitions and interpretations found in 
this bulletin represent the best of available knowledge and 
practicable expectations in homemaking education. The 
problems suggested below, dealing mainly with questions of 
objectives, are expected to arise as further developments 
take place in this field ; but for sake of concrete analysis these 
problems are here stated as of the present, and with no in- 
tention of conveying adverse criticism. 

1. It is unfortunate that the law uses the term "home 
economics " which describes neither a vocation nor the com- 
mon characteristics of a group of vocations as do the terms 
" commercial," " professional," etc. The words " home 
economics " will long continue to connote a group of tech- 



Vocational Homemaking Education 265 

nical studies only, in spite of all effort to the contrary. 
Educators should now make concerted efforts to settle on 
more serviceable terminologies. 

2. Why should it be held that in " separate vocational 
schools of home economics " which have " but little articu- 
lation with the other phases of work of the school system " 
the courses offered " are usually two years in length, al- 
though a few schools offer four-year courses " ? Are these 
arrangements defended? Ought not administrators move 
steadily toward short, intensive courses, each composed of 
short units, in vocational homemaking? Will not "long 
courses '' perpetuate the weaknesses of " long-course," over- 
technical, insufficiently practical, industrial, agricultural and 
commercial courses? 

3. Is it well to try to force the word " laboratory " to in- 
clude the meanings given ? Etymologically, the word *' lab- 
oratory " may mean the same as workshop or place of pro- 
ductive work; but historically and practically, in thousands 
of industrial establishments, colleges, and other centers of 
research, it now means specially equipped places of experi- 
mentation, investigation, testing, and study. It once meant, 
also, a place of production of drugs ; but even this meaning 
is becoming obscured. To try to use the term in a special 
sense as designating a place for "practice in all the home 
activities which are taught within the (vocational) school, 
such as housekeeping, garmentmaking, etc.," is to court end- 
less misunderstandings, misdirected effort and perpetuation 
of old traditions of technical instruction. A laboratory is 
not 2i place for the practice of a vocation : that is a farm, 
shop, office, kitchen, home, or school. Let a homemaking 
school, using " local (or actual) homes " or " school homes " 
for practice, have one or more small laboratories for test- 
ing, experimentation, etc. ; but call the practice place a school 
home or an actual home. 

4. Is it wise to provide so extensively for the necessarily 



266 Vocational Education 

artificial equipment suggested? Homes are found in large 
numbers within a dozen blocks of almost all except country 
schools. These are real homes, where real productive work 
must be done. Judging by experience in other fields of 
vocational education, artificial equipments of the kind pro- 
posed can be used for genuinely laboratory purposes and for 
demonstration purposes, but never effectively for practice 
purposes. More readily than in almost any other field it 
should prove practicable in homemaking to establish coop- 
erative or part-time arrangements. To realize the max- 
imum benefits, these should be on a project basis. 

5. "Vocational subjects to be selected (for a course in 
vocational home economics) should be determined by an 
analysis of the occupation." This is, of course, indispen- 
sable, but it should be noted that, for practical purposes : 

a. Such an analysis by strands of work or types of daily 
duty is almost valueless unless it also somehow indicate de- 
grees of proficiency in each. All homemakers in America 
now, the very poor no less than the good, can cook, serve, 
repair clothing, care for children, buy furniture. But we 
want the next generation to do these things better. 

b. Because of the few fundamental types of homemaking 
and the universality of home activities, central authorities 
(state or, preferably, national) can make these occupational 
analyses to best advantage. Individual teachers need much 
help here, especially while standards are so vague. As sug- 
gested before, home economics teachers are usually insuffi- 
ciently equipped with practical knowledge of home produc- 
tive processes (as carried on in actual homes) as these should 
be scientifically analyzed, described, and evaluated. 

6. " The law provides that schools or classes giving in- 
struction to persons who have not entered upon employment 
shall require that at least half of the time of such instruc- 
tion shall be given to practical work on a useful or produc- 
tive basis." But the Federal Board here holds " practical 



Vocational Homemaking Education 267 

work on a useful basis " to mean " instruction in vocational 
subjects designed as preparation for homemaking." Expe- 
rience will undoubtedly show that this interpretation is in- 
defensible either as good law or good pedagogy. Practical 
work on a useful basis is just as capable of recognition and 
of being provided in homemaking as in gardening, dressmak- 
ing, carpentry, elementary school-teaching, and hospital 
practice. 

7. Home projects are recommended. But the rank and 
file of teachers can make little or no progress in home proj- 
ect work until the leaders shall have worked out guidance 
materials no less elaborate than are those now found for lab- 
oratory practice in technical instruction. Many model proj- 
ects worked out in utmost detail, and hundreds in outline 
involving close adjustments to varying conditions, are re- 
quired as preliminary to any effective utilization of the proj- 
ect method. These should be available in booklet form. 

XL Household Arts as Liberal Education 

It is very important that schools of general education, and 
especially those dealing with girls from 12 to 16 years of 
age (the period of true amateur spirit of production) should 
offer courses of household arts, conceived very much as are 
now home gardening, scouting, and the best manual training, 
as a means of genuine liberal education. Such courses 
should preferably be elective, should occupy from two to 
four hours weekly, and should center in " project " work and 
general inspirational reading. For a few girls vocational 
skills and knowledge will doubtless accrue from these 
courses, as they do for boys in home gardening and shop- 
work; but unless these are regarded as incidental products 
the " liberalizing " spirit of the work will be spoiled. Prob- 
ably appreciations and ideals of ultimate vocational signifi- 
cance will also accrue for many, but these also should nor- 



268 Vocational Education 

mally be regarded as incidental or secondary accompani- 
ments of effective liberal education suited to these ages. 
A few general theses are submitted: 

1. The fundamental difficulties now encountered in real- 
izing valuable results from home economics instruction by 
departmental teachers with girls from 12 to 16 years of age 
are due in large part to confusion of purposes between voca- 
tional and liberal. The courses offered constitute minor 
offerings in schemes of education primarily liberal or gen- 
eral; the specialized teachers have in view ends that are 
somewhat vaguely vocational, at least so far as technical in- 
struction can serve these ends under the circumstances. 

2. The primary purpose of schools for children from 
twelve to fourteen years of age is the giving of liberal, as 
distinguished from vocational, education. For pupils who 
elect to continue their general or liberal education in regular 
high schools, primary purposes should also be found in lib- 
eral education. There is no evidence that a small amount 
— one tenth to one third — of total time available, given 
to vocational education, can be made to function as assured 
vocational competency. 

3. Household arts for girls from 12 to 16 years of age 
(and, if motive can be enlisted, for boys as well) can cer- 
tainly be made a means of liberal education. To effect this 
will probably require some important modifications in the 
means and methods now usually employed. 

4. The objectives of liberal education are less easily 
defined than those of vocational education, the most visible 
and measurable outcome of which is power of producing in 
a specified field and for a prolonged period, valuable service 
or goods, commonly of the kind called " exchangeable," and 
the exchangeable worth of which is usually for convenience 
given a money value which readily serves as a measure. 
" Liberal " education has as its objectives the production of a 
variety of qualities, many of which may be included under 



Vocational Homemaking Education 269 

such terms as appreciations, tastes, sentiments, ideal valua- 
tions, ideals, insights, understandings. Liberal education 
in a given field — language, literature, science, sociability, 
art, nature, society, religion, government, agriculture, house- 
hold arts, urban surroundings, etc., etc. — seeks the human- 
istic ends of deepened and widened social sympathies. 

It is very difficult to get teachers to understand the dif- 
ference between, for example, vocational training and ama- 
teur execution, because too few teachers have ever been defi- 
nitely trained for their vocations, as have been physicians, 
nurses, locomotive engineers, dentists, military officers, and 
architects. College professors, superintendents, principals 
of schools, high school teachers, and home economics teach- 
ers are rarely, if ever, trained to a determinate work of 
teaching. They have received much instruction, of course, 
which, more or less vaguely, has been assumed to be neces- 
sary to their success as teachers or executives. But for the 
rest they have " picked up " their vocations in a na'ive, prim- 
itive, and more or less " hit or miss " fashion. Hence, edu- 
cators find it exceptionally difficult to form distinct ideas of 
what is meant by specified specialized vocational training. 

5. What will be some of the means and methods of 
" liberal " household arts education ? 

a. It must not be obligatory. The girl must be attracted 
to it, not driven to it. 

b. It must, to the maximum extent practicable, use the 
girl's own home, yard, bedroom, mother, father, brothers 
and sisters, pets, dress, health, and aspirations as means of 
objective interpretation, but always only in the friendliest 
cooperative spirit. Nothing forced or inquisitorial will do 
here. To a large extent, teaching must be impersonal, ref- 
erence always being made to " third parties." 

c. Much reliance must be placed on stimulating reading. 
We have hardly begun yet to produce readings idealizing 
and interpreting the home, as the army, scouting and busi- 



270 Vocational Education 

ness enterprise have been idealized for boys. Results of in- 
dividual reading must, of course, be socialized by confer- 
ence, discussion, reports, etc. 

d. The demonstration of standards by " model apart- 
ment," house, room, article of furniture, curtain, bed, set 
table, dress, home apparatus, should play a part as objecti- 
fying means, but due allowances should be made for the 
" soullessness " of these when they are not in practical 
operation or use. 

e. Demonstrations of process — cooking, clothes-mak- 
ing, bedmaking, washing of baby, gardening — give vitality 
and concrete interpretation of standards. The apperceiving 
powers of girls are obviously great here toward the forma- 
tion of tastes and standards. 

/. Projects are especially valuable as educational means, 
and naturally the majority will be " home projects " — 
that is, the inspiration and direction will come from the 
school, but the time, place, and, largely, the means of execu- 
tion will be provided by the home. The range of projects 
offered by the school should be as extensive as practicable 
so as to give utmost latitude for choice by learners. Proj- 
ects for purposes of liberal education should possess ele- 
ments of novelty, appeal to creative powers, and should en- 
list all that can best be summarized as " amateur powers." 

6. What would be some of the specific objectives of 
household arts organized as a means of liberal education for 
girls from 12 to 16 years of age? 

a. To help the girl to see her own home in its most ideal 
light. All over southern France, we read, the war-dislo- 
cated women will take even one room, a bed, a trunk, and a 
little stove and will make a nest, a home, a haven, a foyer, 
for frightened, tired, and sleepy children, a place to which 
the lonesome hard-driven man comes back as to the center 
of existence for rest, the supreme recreative activities, and 
social uplift. Only the woman, rich in homemaking in- 



Vocational Homemaking Education 271 

stincts, customs, and, perhaps, training, can make the real 
home. Can we not, by readings, pictures, discussions, 
model apartments or houses, help to see the home as the 
little central power plant or cell whence radiates much of 
the social energy that makes the world go well ? 

h. To help the girl appreciate the facts and problems of 
the financial upkeep of the home through labor given out- 
side. 

c. To appreciate the fact that labor, devotion, and man- 
agement, wisely given in the home, are in the highest degree 
productive, even though not appearing in the United States 
Census as '' gainful occupations." 

7. The spirit of the school of liberal education is largely 
that of high-grade play; the spirit of the vocational school 
must be that of serious work. Only one worker in ten thou- 
sand can afford to pick daisies as he travels the roads of 
work. The spirit of liberal education is that of the traveler 
for recreation and enlightenment; the spirit of the vocational 
school is that of the man who has business at a given desti- 
nation, which destination he must reach at the earliest pos- 
sible moment. The spirit of the school of liberal education 
is diffusive, catholic, rich in varied human contacts; the 
spirit of the vocational school is one of concentration of 
effort, singleness of purpose, and contacts limited to those 
essential in the economic process, moving directly toward 
fulfillment. '' Work while you work," is the motto of the 
vocational school; "play while you play," of the liberal 
school. 

For interpretations as to what is meant by " liberalizing " 
education, we must go to such fields as literature, music, 
history, geography, plastic art, travel, the moving pictures, 
current reading, and gardening. 



CHAPTER IX 

PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION 

It is not the purpose of this book to analyze the numerous 
problems of vocational education which are peculiar to that 
group of callings which we designate " the professions." 
It is well known that in very large measure these problems 
vary greatly with each profession. The history of legal 
education presents almost no points of similarity to that of 
engineering education; and both differ greatly from theo- 
logical, nursing, and military education respectively. 

But there are a number of current problems of profes- 
sional education which are almost identical with those found 
in other vocational fields. Analysis of these may assist in 
the determination of general principles. In almost all the 
professions there are found tendencies towards specializa- 
tion. Wherever, in professional education, schools have 
been substituted for apprenticeship, strong demands are felt 
for more effective training as against instruction. 

Specialization of Professional Education. — In every pro- 
fession conflicting ideals and practices exist as regards spe- 
cialization of practice. These conflicts disturb in a measure 
current plans for better professional education. 

It is uncertain as to how far in the near future further 
specialization may be expected. These are some suggestive 
phases of the general problem involved : 

1. Teaching as a professional field is undoubtedly in 
process of extensive specialization. For many years, col- 
lege teachers have specialized along the lines of their subject- 
matter. All secondary education has likewise developed 

272 



Professional Education 273 

departmental teaching with the result that men and women 
preparing for this work find themselves more and more 
obliged to become specialists. It is sometimes held as ad- 
vantageous by employing authorities in large schools if 
these secondary school specialists shall have given service 
in either an elementary school or very small high school 
where specialization is impossible, but to impose such pre- 
vious experience as a requirement is now held as imprac- 
ticable, and unfair to the lower schools. When, therefore, 
we speak to-day of the '^ teaching profession " we are in 
reality including thereunder a very wide range of specialists 
such as : kindergartners ; primary school teachers ; elemen- 
tary school teachers ; departmental teachers of drawing, 
music, physical training, French, German, English, history, 
art, mathematics; and also a large number of vocational 
school specialists such as teachers of stenography, machine 
shop practice, plumbing, technical mathematics, etc. 

2. In medicine there has been for many years a tendency 
for the more capable men seeking the most remunerative 
work to become specialists, not uncommonly after a period 
devoted to general practice. Hence the public recognizes 
the existence of specialists on: eye, ear, nose, and throat; 
gynecological practice; diseases of children; pulmonary com- 
plaints, etc.; and also not only surgery as a division by 
itself, but in addition specialties in operative surgery. Fur- 
thermore, in large cities, one detects a distinct tendency 
towards more extensive specialization still, such as specialists 
in diagnosis, in after-care, etc. 

The oculist and the dentist may be the forerunners of 
an army of specialists who will, from the start, devote them- 
selves to their limited field of work only. Optometry, now 
legalized in a number of states, may be an early example. 

The field of medicine, on its diagnostic, curative, and pre- 
ventive sides, is becoming so large that still further special- 
ization may be expected. Public health service, medical 



274 Vocational Education 

inspection in schools, surgical and medical work in armies, 
hospital practice, etc., all involve material differentiations 
among workers in medicine. 

At the present time, except as regards dentists and ocu- 
lists, it may be said broadly that professional theory favors 
the maintenance of organization of medical teaching and 
training on the basis of broad preparation at the outset, 
followed, after a period of general practice, by specializa- 
tion. This was formerly the prevailing attitude also as 
regards the training of teachers and engineers. 

How far such an ideal can be maintained on an econom- 
ical basis is doubtful. The analogies of almost all other 
fields of human occupation strongly suggest that specializa- 
tion at the outset is more or less inevitable in medicine as 
it has proven in other fields; but that such specialization 
must be so organized as to give adequate knowledge of re- 
lated subjects goes without question. It is quite possible 
that the growth of dentistry as a separate profession sug- 
gests what may ultimately appear in many departments of 
medical practice, namely that from the very outset, carefully 
selected persons will be trained for the exercise of special- 
ties. This may necessitate also the development of 
specialties in general diagnosis, followed by diagnosis as a 
highly expert function for the few rare leaders, as sug- 
gested by the experiences reported from Rochester, Minn. 
Unless the practice of medicine comes to be a public func- 
tion supported largely at public expense, it seems impossible 
that the prolonged preparation now required by the more 
advanced institutions can be met on the part of those who 
must ultimately carry on medical practice among the poor, 
or in rural areas. 

3. In the practice of law, as in the practice of medicine, 
there is an obvious tendency towards specialization, but 
only after a broad basis of general training and an expected 
period of more or less general practice. In large offices 



Professional Education 275 

beginners not infrequently specialize from the outset. But 
few, if any, proposals seem yet to have been made that 
specialization in preparation for, and practice of, the law 
should be provided from the outset. But persons desirous 
of finding " shortcuts " to law practice or of using admission 
to practice as a convenient stepping stone to political office 
are still able to find accommodating " short course " and 
evening schools of law which are practically indifferent 
either to admission or training standards. 

4. Military leadership is at the present time broadly 
differentiating the two fields of army and naval leadership, 
the courses of preparation for each field being quite unlike 
each other. Within each field, however, there seems to be 
comparatively little effort as yet towards specialization, but 
the development of special branches of army service such as 
aeronautics, communication, supplies, submarines, etc., will 
probably entail much specialization in preparation if military 
leaders have again to be trained on an extensive scale. 

5. The engineering professions are undoubtedly in pro- 
cess of very extensive differentiation, — a process which 
has been recognized only in part by the institutions giving 
training. Heretofore, engineering colleges have probably 
exaggerated the importance of fundamental training in 
mathematics, applied science, and drawing, and have under- 
estimated the importance of practical participation in active 
work. Graduates of best-supported technical schools now, 
in large measure, promptly specialize on leaving their insti- 
tutions in such various lines as electrical engineering, naval 
architecture, assaying, mining engineering, mechanical en- 
gineering, railway engineering, civil engineering, sanitary 
engineering, etc., and there seem to be good reasons to 
believe that further differentiations may be expected within 
the next few years. 

Here again are problems like those arising in the case 
of medicine. However desirable may appear a prolonged 



276 Vocational Education 

course of preparation for the engineering callings, and how- 
ever much such prolongation of training may be urged by 
those educators who are apt to base their conclusions upon 
a few striking cases of advancement to leadership and in 
research, nevertheless the desirable optimums of efficiency 
and economy in preparation for the various fields of engi- 
neering service are yet to be discovered. Very probably 
there will be the development of programs for the training 
of a wide range of specialists who will prepare for their 
work in shorter time and who can render their service at 
relatively small cost to the community. 

6. The theological callings exhibit as yet comparatively 
little tendency towards specialization, except, possibly, as 
regards missionary service. 

7. Nursing in recent years has become substantially a 
woman's calling, but because of the peculiar survivals of 
apprenticeship in methods of training for it, such training 
has become almost exclusively standardized in the hospitals. 
The result is that the so-called trained nurse represents an 
investment in training and preparation and natural char- 
acter, which puts such service beyond the reach of any but 
prosperous individuals and public institutions. An inferior 
form of home or sick nurse is now available under some 
conditions but it is not apparent that the training for her 
work has been standardized as yet. 

Various forms of public service are now creating large 
demands for occupations analogous to those of the nurse. 
Medical inspection in schools, public health service in cities, 
welfare service in industrial establishments, to say nothing 
of the demands imposed by war, are requiring specialized 
forms of the nursing service for which adequate specialized 
training has not yet been provided. We are here undoubt- 
edly in the presence of necessity for specialization against 
which naturally the traditions of hospital methods of train- 
ing nurses will long be opposed. 



Professional Education 277 

8. Other professions. There are in process of develop- 
ment a large variety of other callings which gradually 
approximate the character of professions. Among these are 
journalism, agricultural leadership, business administration, 
accountancy, applied science specialties and *' efficiency serv- 
ice." The extent to which these will be specialized when 
fully developed is not now apparent, but every tendency is 
in that direction.^ 

Pedagogy of Professional Education. — No adequate at- 
tention has yet been given to what might be called the 
pedagogy of training for a profession. Professional 
schools, as noted elsewhere, were in the main originally 
simply finishing schools for persons who had completed an 
apprenticeship in the elementary practice of the calling itself. 
Later, as apprenticeship became obsolescent in such fields as 
engineering, medicine, law, and military leadership, the pro- 
fessional school undertook complete responsibility for the 
training of the inexperienced novice, but only very reluc- 
tantly did the earlier schools develop means beyond text- 
book stage of such preparation. Gradually, however, 
laboratories have been introduced to supplement lectures and 
textbook study. Only very recently in medicine and en- 
gineering has actual practice been provided through summer 

1 The following are some o£ the " specialized professions " culled 
from the index of occupations prepared by the Committee on Personnel 
of the U. S. Army (1918) : 

Aeronautical engineer; analyst, food; architect — engineer, landscape, 
naval, ship and all craft, supervising; automobile engineer; bacteriolo- 
gist — food, general, water and ice; cartographer; chemical engineer; 
chemist — acid and dyes, analytical, cement, explosives, fireworks, poi- 
sonous gases, soaps ; civil engineering — bridge, buildings, _ concrete, 
highways or streets, hydraulics, hydro electric power plant, irrigation, 
railroad, structural steel, water supply and drainage; dentist; drafts- 
man; electrical engineer; electrotherapeutist ; epidemiologist; forester; 
heating and ventilating engineer; hydrotherapeutist ; mathematician 
expert — calculus, computer, general, trigonometry; mechanical engi- 
neer; meteorologist; mining engineer; neurologist; nurse; optician; 
osteopath; pharmacist; physician; physicist; psychologist; sanitary 
engineer; scientific obseryer; sewage disposal expert; surgeon; sur- 
veyor; topographer; veterinarian. 



278 Vocational Education 

vacation work and otherwise to supplement technical studies. 
Nursing is the one profession which has persistently based 
its preparation upon the older methods of apprenticeship. 
Under former methods of law instruction the moot or 
" mock " court was the only semblance of practice possible 
to the student. In many essential respects, probably, the 
modern case system of legal instruction (which came as a 
distinct revolution) supplies at least some of the conditions 
of practice. Current proposals for the extension of part- 
time education in professional preparation for engineering 
and teaching reflect a widespread conviction that much more 
practical participation must be provided in the professional 
education of the future. It is not improbable that in engi- 
neering, medicine, teaching, and military leadership, the 
largest and most promising developments of the immediate 
future lie in the direction of the development of part-time 
systems of preparation. 

It "has been suggested at a number of points above that 
quite probably preparation for the exercise of a specialty 
in a profession will constitute a new order in professional 
training and practice in the not distant future. There is 
involved here a conception, still somewhat obscure, of the 
differentiation between two aspects of professional training, 
namely, one in which definite executive ability is made the 
primary purpose, while the other has as its chief end general 
" appreciation." It is sometimes vaguely said, for example, 
that the dentist should be a physician also. Economically, 
of course, it is wholly impracticable to train any one person 
as a physician and add thereto necessary dental training 
and have, as a result, a professional man who can give 
service at a reasonable rate to the public. 

But a better knowledge of the essential aims and methods 
of professional education than we now possess will prob- 
ably make clear to us the fact that the complete training of 
the dentist, while necessarily involving a large amount of 



Professional Education 279 

very definite instruction and training in those fields in which 
he is expected to exhibit proficiency as an adviser and work- 
man, will also involve a somewhat less definite and much 
more general study of a wide range of topics connected with 
the general maintenance of health. For example, it is not 
expected at all that the dentist shall be competent to advise 
patients as regards orthopedic or ocular difficulties. Never- 
theless, some appreciation of the relation of such difficulties 
to the general health of the body might be advisable for the 
dentist and would enable him, at least in some cases, to 
direct his patient to diagnosticians and practitioners who 
could give him the specialist assistance which he needs. 

Similar considerations apply in the case of engineering. 
Quite possibly, the future will see the development of many 
special types of workers in the engineering fields. Primary 
objectives, both in the training and in the practice of such 
specialties, would be the competent execution of the tasks 
commonly falling to their lot. The instruction and training 
necessary for these purposes can well be supplemented by a 
wide range of more appreciative learning as to the problems 
of engineers in general. 

Another illustration may be drawn from the field of 
nursing. The functions of the typical school nurse are now 
being defined with some clearness. Quite obviously a pro- 
longed course of hospital training is not at all essential to 
the making of a competent school nurse. The school nurse 
will not be practitioner or diagnostician in any extended 
meaning of those terms. It will be valuable for the school 
nurse, doubtless, to have had at least a few months in hos- 
pital work, just as it would be of great value that she should 
have had at least a few months in courses designed for the 
training of teachers. Nevertheless, the primary efforts of 
the school nurse in preparation must be directed towards 
developing definite competency for the meeting and solution 
of those problems which the school nurse is likely to encoun- 



28o Vocational Education 

ter. This involves an almost entirely new field of pro- 
fessional training. 

The Professional Training of Teachers. — In America spe- 
cific vocational schools now exist for the training of kinder- 
garten and elementary school teachers. But only in rare 
instances yet do we find schools wherein secondary school 
teachers are trained. Secondary school teachers acquire 
such practical proficiency as they possess in the school of 
experience, often, if not usually, to the heavy loss of the 
pupils upon whom they must practice their untried hands. 
Since our normal schools are, as yet, far too few to supply 
enough teachers for the elementary schools (the vast major- 
ity being women, whose teaching careers last only during 
three to six pre-marriage years) a large proportion of 
untrained novices in elementary education also must acquire 
such competency as they are ever to possess in the '' school 
of experience." 

But vocational schools for teachers will yet be developed 
on a large scale — that is inevitable in our social economy. 
How far may we expect the general principles of vocational 
education to be easily accepted by such schools ? This ques- 
tion is peculiarly important in the case of teachers for 
vocational schools as shown in another chapter. 

Our theories of vocational training in normal schools are 
very incomplete and conflicting in spite of three quarters of 
a century of experience in their evolution. Recent studies 
have shown the extensive variations existing, even within a 
single state, as regards relations of practice to technical 
instruction. In the typical normal school, programs of gen- 
eral and of vocational education are almost hopelessly 
blended. Lack of clearness as to professional objectives 
permits many normal schools to devote substantial propor- 
tions of their energies to the pursuit of such mystical ends 
as the making of " personality," general adaptability, culture, 
common sense, and other qualities, in the endeavor to realize 
which there is much conftision of means and ends. 



Professional Education 281 

In the growth of practice teaching in all schools we find 
ineffective definition of vocational objectives in the training 
of teachers. Originally, such schools were employed 
largely as places of observation. It was customary at first 
to speak of the school attached to the normal school variously 
as '' model school," " school of observation," " experimental 
school," '' school of practice." Only slowly have the va- 
rious possible functions of the practice school for elementary 
teachers been given definition; and in most cases they yet 
fall far short of meeting the requirements of sound voca- 
tional education. 

Practice teaching is still provided for only at the 
end of a considerable period of general or technical study, 
instead of at the outset where it would constitute a concrete 
basis for technical study later. 

Again, only in a few normal schools of the country is 
provision made for taking the initial stages of practice 
teaching on a simple basis for beginners with small classes 
of five or six pupils. In many cases, novices are still placed 
in large schools for comparatively short periods which afford 
little or no opportunity for managerial skill and in which 
the complications of management seriously confine them. 
The better ones, naturally, acquire a reasonable degree of 
competency, but probably, for the average teacher, present 
methods of practice teaching are very imperfect. 



CHAPTER X 

THE ADMINISTRATION OF VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 

Because the movement for vocational education is essen- 
tially contemporary and because there exist few precedents 
to guide organization and administration, the number of 
unsettled problems in this field is exceptionally large. For 
ascertained types of vocational education, what are the most 
effective areas of administration and what the best places 
of location? What are the best sources of support and 
control ? How shall surveys be provided, what are the types 
of schools to be provided, and what the age groups to be 
served ? How can cooperation with labor unions be assured, 
what shall be done with " product " arising from the work 
of the school, can " cooperative education " be made effec- 
tive, and what can be done with " preapprenticeship " and 
continuation school education, and can vocational education 
be compulsory? What is to be the relation of the junior 
high school to vocational education? These are but a few 
of the administrative problems which will require extended 
study on the part of educators and influential laymen in the 
near future. Only very summary analysis is possible at this 
point. 



School Areas The conditions which determine the area 

suitable for the administration of a specified type of voca- 
tional school include the following: (a) The probable mini- 
mum area from within which a number of pupils sufficient 
for economical administration can regularly be assembled who 

282 



The Administration of Vocational Education 283 

desire the form of vocational education under consideration, 
and who will probably follow that vocation; {h) the inclu- 
sion of sufficient facilities for practice work on a productive 
basis, preferably in " going " commercial concerns; (c) the 
development of an area of taxation designed properly to 
distribute the cost of maintaining such schools. For many 
types of professional schools, the state as a whole will 
doubtless continue to be the administrative area as is now 
the case where state universities include engineering, med- 
ical, law, and agricultural colleges, and where the state as a 
whole maintains one or several state normal schools. Even 
where the size of the state makes it expedient to have a 
particular type of vocational school located in more than one 
place (as, for example, state normal schools) experience 
seems to indicate the desirability of employing the state as 
the unit of administration instead of dividing it into dis- 
tricts. The results of using the state alone as the unit of 
administration are advantageous in equalizing the distribu- 
tion of the burdens of support and of the offerings made to 
students. 

-It seems very probable that in the smaller or more sparsely 
settled states many types of specialized trade schools will 
have to be located at centers of population, and that the 
state area as a whole will have to be utilized as a basis for 
the support and administration of these schools. For a time, 
doubtless, the practice at present prevailing will be followed. 
The city as an administrative unit organizes and conducts 
the vocational school. Non-taxed areas (non-taxed for this 
purpose) send their pupils in and pay tuition; and the state 
reimburses the tuition — paying for part of its outlay on 
somewhat the same basis as it reimburses or aids the com- 
munity maintaining the school. But this is hardly a satis- 
factory basis for permanent adoption. It resembles the sit- 
uation prevailing in high school education before high 
schools were made generally free and generally accessible 



284 Vocational Education 

to all young people of the state. Eventually, each type of 
vocational education must be made generally accessible with- 
out cost to suitably qualified persons wherever resident 
within the state; and the property (or other taxed valuables) 
of the state as a whole must bear the burden of supporting 
this education as a needed public enterprise. 

Where, however, certain types of industry concentrate in 
particular regions, it may prove advisable to constitute these 
regions administrative areas for the specific forms of voca- 
tional education designed to prepare for them. This would 
be done on three assumptions: (a) that most, if not all, of 
the learners of the vocations involved would come from 
within the area in question; (b) that only within that area 
would strong interest exist in the maintenance and direction 
of these types of education; and (c) that the taxable val- 
uations properly to be drawn upon for local contributions 
(not state or federal contributions) to this type of education 
owed their origins largely to these localized industries. 

The optimum size of a given type of vocational school 
will have much to do with determining the area most suit- 
able for administration. There are good reasons for be- 
lieving that special types of farming as well as homemaking 
may be very well taught (at least to the extent of intensive, 
2400 hour per year courses, of one or two 3^ears in farming, 
and of six months to one year in homemaking) on the basis 
of one teacher to a group of fifteen pupils, dividing his or 
her time between instruction (which will be largely indi- 
vidual) and supervision of home projects (which will be 
wholly individual). Under these conditions it is possible 
that, in a thickly settled farming area, in which many of the 
boys and girls will desire suitable vocational school training 
(basic rather than extension) in farming and homemaking 
respectively, the administrative area for the school could 
coincide with that for the general high school. 

In the case of schools for the building trades, for railroad 



The Administration of Vocational Education 285 

operation, for salesmanship and various other commercial 
callings, including specialties such as traction engine oper- 
ation, automobile repair, tailoring, barbering, the callings of 
hotel cook and waitress and the like, the probable necessity 
of locating them in populous and generally accessible centers 
will tend at first to make these centers also the administra- 
tive units. If such tendencies prevail we may expect an 
increase in state control, following state supervision. 

The location of a given vocational school within the area 
adapted to it will depend, probably, in most cases, first of 
all on the opportunities existing for cooperative participation 
in part-time work under commercial conditions ; and, second, 
on conditions of accessibility. 

The typical medical college is now located in a city where 
abundant facilities for clinical practice are found. Schools 
of stenography and typewriting are found miost largely de- 
veloped in commercial centers. Schools for nurses are 
naturally established in hospitals, preferably those centrally 
located. Schools of navigation are usually located on boats 
and in harbors. 

In such occupational fields as printing, engraving, ac- 
countancy, acting, sign painting, clothing manufacture, den- 
tistry, pharmacy, optometry, and the like, it is highly prob- 
able that the state as a whole will, in many cases, serve as 
the most convenient administrative area, and that schools 
will be located in the one or more largest cities where 
facilities and opportunities for productive work tend to 
gather. 

It is clear that in the case of many types of vocational 
schools it will be impossible so to locate them that pupils, 
especially those residing in village and rural areas, can live 
at home while attending. Once this necessity is accepted 
in the case of particular types, the obviously economical 
procedure will be to locate the school where cooperating 
practice facilities are most satisfactory. Without doubt the 



286 Vocational Education 

cost to the student of traveling to and from the school will 
eventually be met from public funds because of the sound 
social policy involved. It might also be well within the 
limits of sound public policy to provide from public funds 
for the student's cost of maintenance while away from home. 
Whether such a policy will receive early approval will de- 
pend much upon the after consequences of the war, and the 
extent to which, on the one hand, vocational schools prove 
themselves really effective, and on the other, the willingness 
of the public to extend its investments in vocational edu- 
cation. But if, as is suggested elsewhere, the learner in the 
basic vocational school receives in wages the equivalent of 
his net productive work, his living expenses away from home 
could be in part met without expense to his family or to the 
state. 

Some special cases involving location of schools will arise. 
It is believed by some that the establishment of schools of 
farming for city boys would be profitable to a limited extent. 
Were this done, of course, the practice fields and facilities 
for projects with live stock would require to be provided 
differently from those for farmers' sons. Probably the most 
effective procedure, in case it is found that city boys in 
substantial numbers can be turned towards farming (which 
is far from having been demonstrated), would be for the 
school to rent suitable land in one or more tracts, undertake 
the necessary capital outlay and then sublet to pupils for 
independent, commercial projects as in the case of the home 
projects. Here again it is not certain that facilities can be 
so provided that pupils can reside at home. Where large 
cities are served, suitable land may be found only at such 
distance as to preclude daily commuting. 

Again, in cities, some women will be found, who after 
several years of wage-earning in non-domestic occupations, 
will desire to take courses in homemaking, while still living 
in rented rooms or boarding houses. The provision of suit- 



The Administration of Vocational Education 287 

able practice facilities for these will doubtless entail their 
taking employment as house servants, with stipulations that 
their time shall be sufficiently free to permit of receiving 
the necessary instruction while carrying on productive 
project work in the homes of their employers. 



II 

Support It seems now probable that the support of 

public vocational education will generally be divided among 
at least three agencies — the local community, the state, and 
the nation. Several principles underlie and justify this 
method : (a) The cost of vocational education is heavy. (&) 
Communities_y^y greatly in their respective abilities to 
meet this cost, (c) The benefits of vocational education 
(in the shape of additions made to public wealth by well- 
trained workers) tend to diffuse themselves over the entire 
country; hence as far as practicable the burden of supporting 
these schools should be distributed to an extent consistent 
with effective maintenance of popular interest, and feeling 
of local responsibility, {d) The division of the controls 
of initial direction and final approval, between local and 
central agencies which follows naturally on division of 
sources of support, probably gives the most effective admin- 
istration possible to a democracy. Local agencies are apt 
to be concerned with the immediately practical, central agen- 
cies with the scientifically efficient. Local communities can 
rarely afford to employ men gifted in leadership; central 
agencies can frequently do so, because of the wider areas 
served. Local agencies are close to popular demand; cen- 
tral agencies to scientific standards. Frequently the local 
agency can best make initial proposals, while the central 
agency renders its best service in amending, standardizing, 
and approving local proposals. By the development of 
definite differentiations of function between local and cen- 



288 Vocational Education 

tral — community and state, state and federal union — agen- 
cies, so that no twilight zones shall exist permitting divided 
responsibility or evasion of responsibility, it should prove 
increasingly possible to realize the maximum of efficiency 
compatible with final democratic control. 

Private Support of school vocational education (on a com- 
mercial as against a philanthropic basis) has long prevailed 
on a limited scale. The by-education of apprenticeship and 
other forms of participation may be assumed to have always 
rested fundamentally on a commercial basis, — the master 
took and taught his apprentice primarily because it paid 
him to do so. Guilds of masters or journeymen occasion- 
ally collectively bore the expense of some special schooling 
of apprentices. The continuation schools of Germany and 
a variety of forms of older extension school education owed 
their inception largely to these collective efforts. Guilds 
have also maintained scholarships and even schools for full- 
time day education, some of which survive in England 
to-day. 

As noted elsewhere, many professional schools, a very 
few trade schools, and a number of technical-industrial 
schools have been self-supporting, but as a rule these have 
required the aid of endowments to supplement the fees paid 
by students. 

American corporations have at various times and espe- 
cially in recent years undertaken to maintain schools for the 
instruction and training of selected classes of young work- 
ers. The latest of these attempts are the " vestibule " and 
" upgrading " schools established in munitions and other 
plants w^hich were under great pressure to produce war sup- 
plies for the war while being deprived by the U. S. Employ- 
ment Service of freedom to hire employees from rival firms 
or localities. A unique type of private effort is found in 
the plan of leading organizations of American printers 
(employers and employees) to undertake collective action in 



The Administration of Vocational Education 289 

the training of certain classes of skilled workers as special- 
ists for their industries. 

In spite of the variety and commendable character of 
these attempts, few careful students, it is believed, have any 
serious expectations that private effort can, under American 
conditions at least, prove at all adequate to the support of 
the vocational education needed in this country in the future. 
Some of the reasons for this position do not yet seem, how- 
ever, to be popularly understood. The contention, often ex- 
pressed by individualists in spiteful tones, to " let employers 
train their own workers " is not infrequently heard also 
from educators of prominence. School authorities, voicing 
demands for economy in public expenditures, often take the 
stand that the cost of directly specialized trade or other 
vocational training is not a legitimate charge upon public 
funds. Obviously there still exists much confusion in the 
public mind, some of which should be cleared up by con- 
sideration of the sociological problems involved. 

Where the employers of certain forms of service are very 
much scattered and not well organized for cooperative uti- 
lization of service, it is clearly futile to expect them to train 
new workers to replace the old. We are all employers of 
physicians and lawyers, but we do not cooperate to this end. 
Hence we make no direct attempts to give these employees 
of ours vocational education. They get that by private 
effort, or as result of endowment, or through the state, and 
then sell their services to us individually. 

But where employers do cooperate, as in church organiza- 
tions, their organizations at some point take charge of voca- 
tional education, either privately or through municipality 
or state, often aided by endowments. Thus we get agencies 
for the vocational education of priests, teachers, and military 
leaders. 

Where employers have formed a corporate organization 
— as in a stock company — on a large scale and with re- 



290 Vocational Education 

sources sufficient to enable them to plan their work far 
ahead, there would be no more inherent reason for their 
refusing to train their own workers than to provide in 
advance of need for their own buildings and machinery, 
were it not for the crucial fact that ownership of laborers 
cannot be secured, hence no individual employer could be 
given any guarantee that he could reap what he had sown 
in the way of investing in the vocational education of those 
who are to be the workers of the years to come. When 
persons who are controlled by, rather than in control of, 
vague generalizations say " let industry train its own work- 
ers," they probably picture all of the employers in a given 
field of production acting openly and deliberately in concert 
— a condition, of course, which both public opinion and 
legislation have striven strenuously to prevent, and which, 
except in rare situations, the very fundamental natural laws 
of economic production effectually prevent. Usually a 
builder is not in competition with a printer or cloth manu- 
facturer ; but normally one builder is in sharpest competition 
with other builders, both for opportunities to sell service 
and also to buy subsidiary service. If one builder were to 
make any investment in the training of prospective workers, 
he knows that he would probably promptly lose them to his 
rivals. (It can safely be assumed that apprenticeship, to 
the extent which it is found in the building, manufacturing, 
mining, or transportation industries, does not now cost the 
individual employer anything. ) 

Where conditions give to one employer a substantial 
monopoly of opportunities he naturally begins to invest in 
systematic vocational education. The most noteworthy 
example of this at present is found in municipal telephone 
service, especially where the employment of girl workers is 
involved. These, living mostly at home, are not " mobile " 
workers, as between different cities. Within a given city 
homemaking is the only extensive " competitive " occupa- 



The Administration of Vocational Education 291 

tion, but this usually comes only after sufficient years of 
service have been rendered to repay outlay on training. 

Large corporations — telegraph companies, railway cor- 
porations, department stores, manufacturers protected in a 
measure by patents — often undertake to give a moderate 
amount of vocational education to their actual or potential 
employees ; but everywhere these attempts seem to find pre- 
mature limits in conditions growing out of the mobility of 
labor and the rivalry of competing concerns. 

In a broader sense, of course, every employing agency is 
giving vocational by-education through supervision. But 
this is not intended to entail any cost in advance of the 
worker's production. The wage rate for beginners takes 
care of that. 

The following are submitted as representing sound prin- 
ciples in regard to vocational education under private 
auspices : 

1. Vocational by-education through employment or pro- 
ductive work can be successful from the standpoint of the 
employer only when the product of the learner is sufficient to 
provide for the usual charges against production — wages, 
overhead expense, interest, and profits. 

2. Vocational by-education is usually not economical or 
effective from the standpoint of the employee. 

3. Where producers or consumers have such corporate 
organization that they can be assured of the services of 
those in whose direct vocational education they make a sub- 
stantial investment, it becomes a natural course for them to 
develop facilities for such training. But society is endan- 
gered by the monopolistic character of such organizations, 
especially those devoted to production; and eventually its 
control and attendant guarantees of normal returns of all 
natural monopolies create conditions under which the cost 
of vocational education is practically guaranteed by the state 
— as it was also in the case of vocational schools established 
by the war industries. 



292 Vocational Education 

4. It is futile to expect sharply competing corporations 
to unite effectively in providing vocational training for work- 
ers. Whether employers' and employees' organizations can 
in the future so unite without detriment to public interest 
is not yet apparent. 

5. In no event can we expect private support of voca- 
tional education to develop adequately to meet the needs of 
more than a negligible fraction of the two to three millions 
of young people who must annually find their way into 
productive occupations in America. 

Public Support. — Within the last dozen years nearly 
every state in the union has, by its legislation, committed 
itself to the public support of one or more forms of voca- 
tional education. For nearly half a century, indeed, many 
of them had through permissive legislation legalized expend- 
itures of public funds for commercial education and also 
for manual training, household arts and agricultural courses ; 
and while this had probably not been done in the conviction 
that the work offered would function in specific and imme- 
diate vocational competency, nevertheless there was involved 
acceptance of the idea that the courses thus encouraged 
would ultimately prove more valuable for vocational than 
for any other reasons. In the debates and discussions on 
this subject during the twenty years from 1890 to 1910 the 
thesis was often strongly supported " that trade workers 
and factory operatives should not be trained at public ex- 
pense." Equally it was held inexpedient that the schools 
should train people to be " cooks " or " farmers." But 
approval of public support for these forms of so-called 
vocational education that would teach the " principles," or 
the " underlying science and art " of vocations gained stead- 
ily notwithstanding the illusory character of objectives often 
vaguely held. 

When, therefore, the conviction gained currency between 
1906 and 1915 that much of the work of technical high 



The Administration of Vocational Education 293 

schools, manual training, agricultural, and household arts 
courses, then being developed, would not meet public expec- 
tations for vocational education, the soil had been prepared 
for more positive and practical proposals. It was now a 
matter of only moderate difficulty, once leading educators 
and legislators were given accurate information as to pur- 
poses contemplated, to have enacted legislation providing 
for state and even national support, for industrial, agricul- 
tural and homemaking education. The legislation enacted 
during this period in Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jer- 
sey, New York, Wisconsin, and other states as well as the 
"Smith-Hughes Act" passed by Congress clearly indicates 
the serious intentions of legislators that the education thus 
provided for should be genuinely vocational and should be 
freely, if not generously, supported at public expense. 

The problems involved in the public support of vocational 
education were thoroughly discussed during this period ; and 
agreement has finally become so general on the principles 
involved, that only a summary is needed here. 

Principles of Public Support. — 1 . It is now agreed that, 
from the standpoint of sound public policy the state is at 
least no less obligated to support needed vocational education 
than it is to support secondary or collegiate general educa- 
tion. Society at large, and not the individual educated, is 
the chief beneficiary. Furthermore, if by making such edu- 
cation free of tuition charges many more persons and among 
these many of the most promising persons can be induced 
to take it, then is the state no less justified in assuming the 
entire burden of this education than it is in fully supporting 
secondary general education. 

2. The desirable limits to public support of vocational 
education can only be determined by analysis of concrete 
situations. Where the vocation is of exceptional impor- 
tance to the state and where individual or other private effort 
would not suffice to provide educated workers, then collec- 



294 Vocational Education 

tive action or public support is easily justified, as has long 
been the case in the training of military leaders, public school 
teachers, and other public servants, as well as, more recently, 
agricultural experts and industrial technicians. 

Where a vocation has traditions of apprenticeship, public 
support of extension or supplemental vocation is easily en- 
listed ; and where a vocation has had no such apprenticeship 
public support of basic vocational education can be procured, 
as in the case of commercial education. 

But public support is with difficulty enlisted for those 
forms of basic vocational education in which apprenticeship 
has long prevailed and where it is believed it should prevail 
still. For this there are several contributing causes. Or- 
ganized labor naturally favors labor or guild control of 
education through apprenticeship. Educators still have 
little confidence in their own ability to organize effective 
basic trade schools. The public looks askance at productive 
work as a means of education. Hence we have, as yet, very 
few examples of trade training at public expense that is 
genuinely basic; existing schools offer mostly either pre- 
apprenticeship instruction and training (in the strict sense 
of these words) or else parallel or subsequent extension 
technical instruction. 

It is obvious also that the public is unwilling to support 
vocational education for those vocations, usually highly 
specialized and often apparently of the semi-skilled variety, 
in which large concerns are the chief employers. As noted 
elsewhere, the public vaguely feels that it is socially obli- 
gatory upon, as well as profitable for, these concerns " to 
train their own workers." This public attitude is reinforced 
naturally by educators, nearly all of whom feel that the 
obstacles to public administration of basic training for these 
vocations are almost insuperable. 

For a number of years popular interest in public support 
of vocational education was most easily enlisted on behalf 



The Administration of Vocational Education 295 

of children or youths themselves and especially those whose 
poverty or lack of particular abilities early cause them to 
become misfits in, or truants from, public schools of general 
education. But the programs provided '' to hold children 
longer in school/' " to provide for the mechanically minded 
boy " to " fill the gap between fourteen to sixteen " or to 
help the " neglected groups " were usually conceived in a 
spirit of adherence to the panacea of '* general " or at least 
'' prevocational " education and they have probably borne 
very little fruit, and that of pretty sour quality. 

But experience, experimentation, the awakening public 
conscience, better understanding of real educational values, 
and the war itself all seem to be working together to bring 
society to the point where it will freely support any kind and 
any amount of demonstrably genuine and functional voca- 
tional education which visibly contributes to the well-being 
of society, the democratic self-realization of all individuals, 
and which cannot be guaranteed by non-public agencies. 
The detailed applications of these principles to many voca- 
tions remain to be made. Shall we have publicly supported, 
basic vocational schools for cigarette makers? locomotive 
engineers? sea captains? hotel clerks? expert milkers? gro- 
cers' clerks? lawyers? Shall we seek to provide at public 
expense for the complete {i.e. to journeyman stage) voca- 
tional education of tailors? plumbers? pressmen? job print- 
ers ? railway mail clerks ? tugboat engineers ? cutters in shoe 
factories? If, to people of certain types of ability and 
under certain economic necessities, sixty days of intensive 
training for factory operative specialties is relatively as 
important for vocational success and happiness in life as 
four years' training for the prospective engineer or physi- 
cian, or two years for the prospective stenographer, or 
pharmacist, shall we provide it at public expense? 

It will be evident to the student of educational policies 
that these problems of limitation to kinds and degrees of 



296 Vocational Education 

vocational, resemble very closely similar problems in the 
fields of liberal and physical education. We now try to 
force on all certain minimum attainments in civic and 
cultural fields; but we also deny to large numbers, because 
of inferior ability or interest, opportunities to share in 
advanced forms of publicly supported cultural and civic 
education. Policies of different states differ somewhat, and 
everywhere they are growing more generous and wise; but 
limitations are still, and always will be, recognized. 

Public Control It can be assumed at the outset that 

public control of privately supported vocational education 
is at present alien to American public policy. Where the 
state imposes minimum standards for practice (licensing, 
as in the case of medicine, law, engine-firing, electric instal- 
lation, nursing, etc. ) these naturally greatly affect standards 
of private education through apprenticeship or schools; but 
these conditions touch as yet only a few vocations. 

Public control must be thought of, therefore, as a condi- 
tion or accompaniment of public support. Several sets of 
problems arise in this connection, (a) Where different gov- 
ernmental areas — local or municipal, regional or state, and 
national — share in such support, how shall functions of 
control and direction be distributed ? (b) Within any given 
area shall attempts be made to give special functions of con- 
trol, by mandate or mere opportunity, to one set of interests 
in some way related to the particular vocation, education for 
which is in question — such as consumers (of its product), 
employers, employees? (c) Within any area is it desirable 
to unify the control and higher direction of all forms of 
publicly supported education, or is it best to create govern- 
mental agencies charged with responsibilities towards par- 
ticular forms? 

Local vs. Central Control. — In a number of states sup- 
port of vocational education derives from three sources — 
district or municipality, state, and nation. Paralleling devel- 



TJie Administration of Vocational Education 297 

opment of this complex means of support have grown 
certain obvious tendencies in control. The local area in- 
itiates and actually administers schools ; the state supervises, 
and, as a final condition of disapproval, withholds its con- 
tribution; and, similarly, the national authorities supervise 
work of the states, and as final and effective evidence of 
disapproval, withhold funds. 

We here see in evolution administrative mechanisms 
which are probably sound in principle, although sometimes 
slow and cumbrous in operation. The local area is, nor- 
mally, most cognizant of its own needs — immediate needs, 
at least. State and nation are best able to procure and or- 
ganize the work of specialists. In general practice, local 
and central authorities arrive through conference at working 
policies and only very rarely will the local authorities refuse 
to " play," or the central authorities find it necessary to have 
recourse to the penalizing expedient of withholding funds. 

All sorts of specific objections are raised to this distribu- 
tion of control functions in practice. In America traditions 
of local self-government can easily persist along with entire 
willingness to share in subsidies from central sources. But 
it is certain that all sound governmental tendencies in this 
country are in the direction of providing that state and 
national grants of all sorts shall be accompanied by super- 
vision sufficient to insure their proper and effective expendi- 
ture. On the other hand the freedom of the local com- 
munity to " go alone " if it desires is not interfered with. 

The fundamental weakness in this system of control will 
not be found in its immediate administration. For those 
kinds of vocational education that should be widely dis- 
tributed and the need for which can easily be felt, the 
system may prove more effective and more democratic than 
any other. But it must be remembered that we shall yet 
require hundreds of forms of vocational education the need 
for which will not be intensely felt in any given locality, 



298 Vocational Education 

nor can local initiative be found sufficient to organize it. 
For these forms the local area may often have to be not less 
than the state; and in many cases, even the state area is too 
small. 

It is not improbable that we shall have to provide in the 
near future for gigantic schools wherein to train locomotive 
firemen and engineers. It would clearly be unprofitable to 
localize schools for this purpose in cities or even local rail- 
way distributing points. Probably it would be unwise to 
ask each state to establish such a school. Quite possibly the 
interest of economy and efficiency would best be served by 
having ten or fifteen such schools for the country as a whole, 
located at strategic railroad centers where abundant facil- 
ities for part-time practice could be available. 

If we are to have comprehensive systems of vocational 
education, it is obvious therefore that provision must be 
made for initiation and control through very large areas 
in many cases. We may find ourselves able to rely very 
satisfactorily on local initiative for such forms as home- 
making, farming, indoor salesmanship, and house carpentry. 
Local effort may also amply suffice to provide for highly 
localized industries — meat packing for Chicago, shoemak- 
ing for Brockton, steel mill work for Pittsburgh, textile work 
for Lowell and Philadelphia, pottery for Columbus, paper 
manufacturing for Holyoke, fruit packing for Stockton, 
automobile construction for Detroit. But in a wide range 
of other forms, perhaps national agencies may have to lead, 
as was, indeed, done in war time. 

Advisory Oversight. — No substantial dissent is made to 
the principle that where public moneys are used to support 
vocational education the controlling agencies, local or cen- 
tral, should represent the people as a whole in their govern- 
ing capacity. But in vocational, as in some other forms 
of special education (e.g. that of the blind, or the orphaned, 
and of immigrant adults) it is highly desirable somehow to 



The Administration of Vocational Education 299 

enlist the close cooperative oversight of persons peculiarly 
interested in any particular form. Considerations of voca- 
tional efficiency no less than that of expediency clearly dic- 
tate such action as an offset to the administrative ineffective- 
ness of the normal agencies of democratic government. 

In practice this principle has long been accepted, but in 
ways which require modification for modern schemes of 
vocational education. Public boards to direct such institu- 
tions as agricultural colleges, war academies, normal schools, 
textile schools, and other special technical schools have 
usually been composed of men and women known to be 
specially interested in these respective forms of education. 
At times, indeed, the process of selection has been carried 
so far in this direction that the governing boards have 
tended to represent special or vested interests excessively. 

As regards many forms of vocational education it is clear 
that, besides the collective interest of society in the welfare 
and civic development of the learners involved and also its 
collective interest as representing consumers, in the voca- 
tional output, there are two other interests closely concerned. 
In a constantly increasing proportion of cases, the vocational 
position of the worker for five to twenty years after entry 
upon work, if not for life, is that of an employee. His 
employers must assume large responsibilities for the organ- 
ization and supervision of his work, for his by-education in 
the work itself, and for the determination of his share of 
the product. With the increasing intelligence of workers 
and their growing powers of concerted action it is to be 
desired and expected that employees will share with em- 
ployers in discovering and applying principles controlling in 
these matters. But final decision will necessarily rest with 
those whose economic responsibilities for initiation are 
largest. 

Hence employers are often the most competent factors in 
a given vocation to determine what are desirable and fea- 



300 Vocational Education 

sible specific aims of vocational education for specific special 
fields. Educators schooled in the traditions of general edu- 
cation are usually suspicious of employers in general — 
partly because academic men do not easily learn the lan- 
guage of men schooled in material production, and partly 
because they mistrust the powers and intentions of men 
strong in executive quahties. But this very aloofness of 
attitude and remoteness of understanding constitute, often, 
the best of reasons why the traditional educator should force 
himself often to sit in consultation with men whose daily 
work has forced them into practical acquaintance with the 
conditions and results of vocational proficiency. 

No less appreciative of the realities of a given vocation 
are the daily practitioners of the calling itself. Where, 
sound conditions of apprenticeship have prevailed the qual- 
ified workers have themselves developed and upheld stand- 
ards, which, notwithstanding monopolistic tendencies that 
have from time to time appeared, have enriched the world of 
craftsmanship. 

How, then, can employers and employees, especially in 
the highly organized vocations, be brought into intimate 
relationship to vocational schools, as a means of making 
available their special knowledge, and of preventing the 
'' academic " ignorance of laymen (including general edu- 
cators) outside the vocation from rendering programs vague 
and ineffective ? In some states the device has been tried of 
providing, in conjunction with a specific school or depart- 
ment, for the creation of advisory committees composed of 
representative employers and employees. In a very few 
cases these have worked well; but in many cases they have 
failed to function properly because of faulty administration. 
School boards, superintendents and even school directors, 
are prone to enter upon conferences with these advisers 
without adequate formulation of measures for consider- 
ation. They seem to expect advisory committees to be 



The Administration of Vocational Education 301 

prepared to initiate proposals. These are impracticable 
expectations. To render effective service these advisers 
should have laid before them in concrete detail proposed 
objectives, programs, estimates of results — what, in the 
business world is known as a '' prospectus," with " specifica- 
tions." The reactions of practical men to intelligibly pre- 
sented plans of this sort are certain to be valuable to the 
school authorities; while the overcoming of prejudices and 
hastily formed opinions on the part of the advisers them- 
selves will ultimately redound greatly to the strength of the 
school in the community. 

Many problems of utilizing private and special knowledge 
in school administration remain yet to be worked out. 
Among them are many difficult ones in connection with 
part-time or cooperative education. 

Part-time education, to be at all effective, requires that 
employers and educators cooperate intimately in formulat- 
ing plans and in administration. Much of the part-time 
education now found is of low efficiency because no close 
coordination exists between school and shop work. Each 
follows its own channel ; and nowhere do the channels come 
together. 

Very recently a number of large manufacturers have 
established as private ventures, vestibule and upgrading 
schools. If these are to be extended, they should receive 
public support; and if they receive public support they must 
be under public control; but if that public control is not 
intimately and understandingly correlated with shop con- 
ditions, failure of the ventures is inevitable. 

In some part-time plans the '* coordinator " is made the 
link between the school and the shop, in a sense representing 
each. In one case the teacher of " technical studies " to 
boys becomes an assistant foreman in the shop. 

" Unit " vs. " Dual " Control. — In the earlier stages of 
the establishment of vocational schools in a number of 



302 Vocational Education 

states, legislatures created separate state governing or super- 
vising bodies and permitted the similar erection of local 
authorities independent of those controlling regular schools. 
Fears soon developed that " dual " control would lead to 
harmful " dualisms " in educational administration. 

Various historical and social conditions were involved. 
Historically it has been customary in America to create a 
special public administrative agency (ad hoc as the English 
describe it) for a new or exceptional type of education. As 
noted before, the practice has always prevailed of providing 
special and often local governing boards for agricultural 
colleges, state technical industrial schools, normal schools, 
reform schools, state universities, and the like. Within city 
areas colleges and some other municipal schools have been 
governed by their own boards. 

When the movement for publicly supported industrial and 
agricultural schools of a practical character reached the 
point where legislation could be procured, the proponents of 
these new types of education were often convinced that the 
'' regular " school authorities — boards no less than execu- 
tives often — were hostile to the proposed forms of voca- 
tional training. In many cases there was good evidence that 
this hostility was not so much against the idea of vocational 
education as such, as it was against the practical proposals 
for application of these ideas. The " academic minds," 
long hostile to manual work, now directed their opposition 
to such vulgar means as teaching trades by shop practice, 
farming by working the soil or caring for domestic animals, 
and homemaking by actual '' productive " work in homes. 

Hence the conviction that the " infant industries of voca- 
tional education " must have protection among avowed 
friends if they were to have a fair start. 

But the causes of the opposition to " dual " control in- 
volved much more than " academic " prejudices. If two 
forms of separately administered education are competing 



The Administration of Vocational Education 303 

for public funds, taxpayers and the public are distracted by 
the rival claims for recognition and support. It has also 
been feared that the prospects of " immediate returns " 
which the vocational school could hold out would lure stu- 
dents from the less visible '' values " of general education. 

As far as local administration is concerned, there is now 
little opposition to " unit " control in spite of doubts, some- 
times, as to the actual interest of the academic minds in 
control in the promotion of genuine vocational education. 
State and national supervision naturally develop special 
agencies of oversight, but usually consolidated with those 
for other forms of education in their final control. The 
tendency is steadily towards the unification of ultimate 
supervision and stimulation in some single authority in the 
state and, where the optimum local areas for two or more 
forms of education are coterminous, for districts and 
municipalities as well. 

Ill 

Surveys. — The purposes of surveys for vocational edu- 
cation are of two kinds: (a) the determination of the need 
of particular types of vocational education, and the condi- 
tions of their provision; and {h) the effectiveness and econ- 
omy of established types. For some years to come it is 
obvious that surveys of the second type will be less needed 
than those of the first. 

Surveys initiated with a view to determining needs for 
vocational education can be of two very distinctive kinds, 
in answer respectively to the questions (a) what provision 
of opportunities for vocational training should be made in a 
given area for the youths and adults of that area; and {h) 
what provisions should be made for training persons to fit 
most effectively into going types of vocations? Since much 
of contemporary interest in vocational education has had its 
roots in the aspirations of social economists and educators. 



304 Vocational Education 

it has been natural that several of the surveys heretofore made 
should have been directed primarily to the discovery of 
vocational opportunities. But surveys made from that 
point of departure have almost necessarily proven abortive; 
we as yet know too little about the ways and means of pro- 
viding industrial and commercial education except for a 
bare score of callings. (It is noteworthy, for example, that 
in none of these surveys has it been possible to make de- 
tailed and workable suggestive plans for education for fac- 
tory and salesmanship occupations in spite of the numerical 
supremacy of these two groups.) 

For ordinary purposes, much the most effective method 
of vocational survey for purposes of laying foundations for 
educational policy and program, is that which starts with 
one definitive occupational field at a time. Fundamentally, 
such a survey requires that only a few definite points of 
attack be made : 

1. What is the extent, general character and probable 
future of the vocation in question? 

2. Are the methods by which at present persons are fitted 
for its pursuit (and at each of its levels or varieties) effec- 
tive and economical from the standpoint of the individual, 
and socially suf^cient from the standpoint of society, and 
the particular field of production operating in the service 
of society? And if not, 

3. What are the administrative and pedagogic means and 
methods by which more effective vocational education can 
be provided? 

Questions like the following will be found necessary for 
guidance in details : 

1. Does the occupation require the methodical procedure 
of professional or trade school preparation? 

2. Does the occupation lend itself to measurement of 
results in terms of learning capacities within four or five 
years after school stages of training have been completed? 



The Administration of Vocational Education 305 

3. Does the occupation present opportunities for special- 
ized training towards foremanship, managership, or small 
capitalist operation ? 

(a) What are problems of the future of the capitaHst 
manager or capitalist operator as found in the cases of 
farmer, small storekeeper, restaurant keeper, etc. ? 

4. Can the trade school procure definite connections with 
industry, so that if apprenticeship stages exist, definite pro- 
vision can be made for correlating work of school with 
them? 

5. If a professional calling, does it open opportunity for 
part time participation? If not, should practice stages 
intervene before final degree or diploma is awarded ? 

(a) Consider a general proposal that, except in schools 
doing full productive work in which quantitative as well as 
qualitative standards can be maintained, no diploma or 
degree shall issue until after a period of sufficient successful 
practice supervised by the training institution, 

6. To what extent can any type of vocational school 
other than an extension school justify the maintenance of a 
curriculum predominantly technical in character? 

7. Can the vocational school take a person of no expe- 
rience in, or practical preparation for, the vocation, and set 
out to give him a part or whole of the equipment needed 
for its successful practice? 

8. Should the school presuppose some practical experi- 
ence upon which it undertakes to build, either additional 
practical capacity, or, more commonly, technical knowledge, 
that will be of value in the vocation or will lead to advance- 
ment in it? 

(a) In any survey of a plan for vocational education for 
a given vocation, one of the first essential requisites is an 
analysis of all of the elements or factors entering into com- 
plete preparation for the vocation, in order that the appor- 
tionment may be made of the contributions expected sue- 



3o6 Vocational Education 

cessively from early participation, systematic school educa- 
tion, formal apprenticeship, later experience, etc. From this 
study should be determined the contributions that can most 
effectively be made by the school, whether that be on a full- 
time or cooperative basis. 

In the case of homemaking, some weight must undoubt- 
edly be given the miscellaneous concrete experience obtained 
during the ages 6 to 12, or later, by ordinary participation 
in the home. Similar suggestions apply in the case of 
farmers' boys and any other occupation in which early help- 
ful activities are possible. 

Again, analysis of the kind suggested here should differ- 
entiate along the three lines of practical skill, technical 
knowledge, and social insight, in order that the maximum 
possible contributions of the school in each case can be 
ascertained. 

9. Can vocational preparatory education, in a large num- 
ber of cases, be carried forward completely under the aus- 
pices of a single agency in which few, if any, important 
cooperative adjustments must be made? Types are found 
in the normal school controlling its own practice school, the 
trade school with its own shops, the commercial school with 
its own productive commercial work (if any is employed), 
the medical college completely controlling its own hospitals, 
etc. 

Procedures of the kind here suggested, starting either 
with the locally most extensive lines of productive work, or 
else with local lines in which the need for vocational educa- 
tion seems most urgent or else most practicable, could result 
in the course of a few years in provision of optimum oppor- 
tunities for a majority of the rising generation. Then, and 
usually not until then, might a different type of survey be 
initiated with a view^ to discovering openings for marginal 
groups. But the fact should not be overlooked, at least for 
some years to come, that we have at best only very inade- 



The Administration of Vocational Education 307 

quate means and methods of planning such a survey, or of 
carrying its findings into serviceable application. 

Probable Permanent Types of Organization of Vocational 
Education The following principles as to types of voca- 
tional education of probable permanency are submitted : 

a. In many vocational fields we cannot trust to the meth- 
ods of simple participation or even organized apprentice- 
ship, to give society the vocational powers required in its 
members. Hence sooner or later vocational schools for 
nearly all types of callings will be provided. 

h. The technical school, as offering extension courses for 
persons already possessed of a large degree of experience, 
now occupies a place of substantial and increasing impor- 
tance. Its offerings of evening courses (or afternoon 
courses for homemakers), correspondence courses, "dull 
seasons" all-day courses (as now for farmers), or "short 
unit " full-time courses for operative specialists desiring 
to add a specific new form of mastery to their present equip- 
ment (as has happened so frequently in our ship-building 
campaign), may be expected to increase in variety, con- 
creteness and purposiveness of organization, and usefulness 
in providing vocational extension for experienced workers. 

c. But the technical school as a school of initial voca- 
tional education may be expected to disappear, except pos- 
sibly in a few cases where the content of a vocation involves 
a very large proportion of abstract knowledge and can be 
effectively followed only by individuals possessing highly 
developed special endowments of mind, especially of an 
"abstract" character. Law schools, theological schools, 
and even some types of engineering schools, may conceiv- 
ably remain long on the basis of " pure " technical schools, 
although the presumption is against the hypothesis, even in 
the case of these institutions. Without doubt present types 
of agricultural schools and colleges, commercial schools, 
homemaking courses, engineering colleges, technical high 



3o8 Vocational Education 

schools, and the like, in so far as they seek to minister to 
the needs of learners who have had no previous practical 
experience, the results of which may he purposefully used 
as a basis for the technical training given m the school, 
will be replaced by a type of basic (not extension) voca- 
tional school, in which the provision of facilities for learn- 
ing through practice of a kind closely akin to the practice 
required in the work-a-day world will constitute the central 
aim, the central problem of administration, and the most 
important concern when it comes to the testing of results. 

d. Not only will vocational schools of the future tend 
steadily to approximate two, and only two, types according 
as they are responsible for either basic or only extension 
vocational education; in each case it is to be expected that 
the unfortunate duality which now exists between practical 
power of execution (skill) and technical knowledge in the 
earlier stages of the learning of an occupation will be at 
least modified. This constitutes, in programs of basic 
training for almost any vocation, a pedagogical problem of 
the first magnitude. In the case of extension teaching 
some progress has been made towards pedagogical syn- 
thesis of technical knowledge and practice by means of 
short unit courses so devised that when the learner, in his 
practical work, has reached the stage where he perceives 
the need of a unit of additional knowledge or skill, he 
can find almost exactly what he requires, in which case 
pedagogic integration is assured. 

e. The tendency will be, without doubt, in most cases 
in the direction of segregating " units " of practical 
achievement — simple stages, easy processes, uncomplicated 
machines, readily mastered projects — for the beginner, and 
as progress in practical accomplishment is made in these, to 
provide closely related units of technical instruction, the 
connection of which with the practical work will be clearly 
evident to the learner. The system prevailing so often at 



The Administration of Vocational Education 309 

present, where practical work and technical training and 
instruction are both given by the school, of keeping the two 
strands almost completely separated will, of course, have to 
be modified. It is easily to be seen, for example, that little 
organic connection is now made between the technical 
studies and the practical work of such vocational schools as : 
medical colleges ; normal schools ; trade schools ; agricultural 
schools with school farms; engineering schools (with vaca- 
tion work). By means of what pedagogical devices this 
pedagogic unification can be accomplished, we do not now 
see, except in a few instances. Undoubtedly the '' home 
project " in. farming has shown large possibilities for agri- 
cultural education; and there seem to be no good reasons 
why the same device should not be applied successfully in 
homemaking education when once the need and desirability 
of basic vocational education for that field shall have been 
accepted. 

/. Wherever practicable, the vocational school of the 
future will probably endeavor to provide that a maximum 
of the productive work used as training in practice shall be 
done in commercial establishments — that is, agencies or- 
ganized primarily for production, instead of in productive 
establishments maintained by the school itself. But in 
many vocations such cooperation may not prove feasible; 
and in most cases it proves highly desirable that, before a 
^earner is " placed out," he shall have been at least initiated 
into productive work in a school-controlled shop, office, fac- 
tory, ship, or other productive agency. Probably exceptions 
to this principle can be made (as experience seems already 
to have shown) in the case of the farm and the home where 
subdivision of labor and overhead organization have not 
been carried so far as to make the reception of the beginner 
a difficult process. We cannot as yet, of course, predict 
the possibilities of the employment of either beginners, or 
of learners who have passed the early stages in the attain- 



310 Vocational Education 

ment of practical experience, in productive establishments. 
At present, it appears that in many vocations cooperative 
arrangements could and will be made; that these will in- 
volve no " philanthropic " contribution on the part of 
employer; and that he will employ this labor at rates which 
will normally prove profitable to him, in view of the extraor- 
dinary " overhead " expense that may be involved in it. 
Those beginnings which have thus far proven successful also 
suggest the very great desirability of giving the learner as 
a wage whatever " net " value accrues from his work. 

g. It is probable, too, that the time is not far distant 
when the documentary evidence given to the person com- 
pleting a supposedly vocational course will be based upon 
the holder's tested powers of accomplishment under com- 
mercial conditions. The licenses now granted to firemen, 
pharmacists, opticians, etc., are supposed to attest standards 
of practical proficiency; as are, likewise. Civil Service ratings 
of stenographers, certain types of inspectors, etc. The- 
oretically there is no impracticability, and there is much 
social promise, in the proposal that in the not distant future, 
the approved diploma from any type of alleged vocational 
school will carry on its face evidence of the holder's prac- 
tical proficiency. 

Age Groupings In educational gatherings the question 

is often asked — " At what age should vocational education 
be commenced? " Usually, but not always, this question is 
put by educators whose study has not carried them to the 
point of thinking of vocational education in terms of known 
and individually considered vocations. They are still think- 
ing of some vaguely abstract form of instruction or training 
which might be given to all pupils alike. To provide con- 
crete thinking it is necessary to ask in return, " Do you 
mean for the vocation of physician? or stenographer? or 
locomotive engineer? or city school superintendent? or sea 
captain? or telegraph messenger boy? or homemaker? or 
plumber ? " 



The Administration oj Vocational Education 311 

The '' Age at which vocational education should be com- 
menced " is obviously dependent upon many factors, (a) 
What is the customary age at which workers are now usually 
accepted into the given vocation? (6) At what age, under 
conditions of vocational education provided in special 
schools, could workers best be inducted into the vocation? 
(c) What are, or what should be, the minimum requirements 
of non-vocational education to be imposed before the youth 
can elect to give his working hours to vocational education 
or practice? (c?) To what extent and under what conditions 
is it profitable to devote the youth's working hours to a 
program of instruction and training partly liberal and partly 
vocational ? , 

1. Age of Effective Entrance Custom dictates for most 

vocations an optimum time of entrance. Men rarely be- 
come ''full responsibility" physicians under twenty-four; 
doffer boys under fourteen ; farm hands under fifteen ; loco- 
motive engineers under twenty-five; school principals under 
twenty-eight; soldiers under nineteen; or telegraph messen- 
gers under fourteen. 

Women rarely become fully approved nurses under twenty ; 
high school teachers under twenty-two; homemakers under 
twenty-two; school principals under thirty; spinners under 
fifteen; salesgirls under sixteen; cash girls under fourteen; 
or waitresses under eighteen. 

These lower limits are obviously dictated by several con- 
siderations, of which vocational skill is only one. A boy of 
sixteen could easily be trained in six months to drive a 
locomotive; but public opinion would not tolerate his being 
put in charge of a passenger train at that age. This voca- 
tion requires the sense of responsibility that only comes with 
age. In practice a man who is ultimately to be a locomotive 
engineer begins some form of railroad work at about sixteen. 
He progresses through several fairly distinct vocations, and 
if " upgrading " facilities are good, and he is the '* right 



312 Vocational Education 

stuff" he can get a passenger train place between twenty- 
five and thirty-five years of age. 

Day telegraph messenger service seems well suited to 
boys between fifteen and seventeen. (Night service is now 
given only to men in some states, because of moral risks.) 
Boys and girls can often perform well " assistantship " tasks 
when they are not old enough to attempt, or skilled enough 
for, the performance of ''full responsibility" vocations. 
Boys, even from twelve onwards, may well render delivery 
service for small stores, bundle carrying, doffing, and cattle 
herding. But in practice men must be twenty or more be- 
fore they can be given responsibilities as clerks in grocery 
stores, farmers, or floormen. 

The only way, therefore, to ascertain what is the most 
effective age for beginning vocational education is to start 
with a survey of a particular vocation. What is the usual 
minimum age at which people now become policemen, street 
car motormen, bank clerks of specified function, sailors, 
rural school teachers, glass blowers' assistants, farmers' 
hired men, journeymen printers? The next question is — 
how much time is normally required to train for each voca- 
tion, and is it not best that such training should be provided 
just before entry upon wage-earning in that vocation? 
Surely only some simple problems in subtraction would 
require solution if we possessed these facts. Occasionally, 
of course, we might find exceptions. It is well known that 
most women in urban environments do not begin '' full 
responsibility " homicmaking until about twenty-two to 
twenty-five years of age. But it is contended that if we are 
to give systematic education for this vocation we shall have 
to provide it for young persons between twelve and sixteen, 
in the majority of cases, if it is to be gotten at all. This 
may be only a counsel of expediency, however. No one 
would contend, probably, that if we could have the full 
working hours and active interest of a woman for one half 



The Administration of Vocational Education 313 

year to prepare her for the homemaking vocation, it would 
be better to take that time at sixteen, seven years in advance 
of her marriage, rather than at twenty-two just prior to 
her marriage. 

Again, it is sometimes contended that if a person is to 
aspire to some vocation of " leadership," he should receive 
some preparation therefor even during the years devoted 
to preparation for his initial vocation. But here again con- 
siderations of pure expediency probably now dictate recom- 
mendations. 

2. Changing Ages of Admission Two opposed tenden- 
cies are evident in prevailing ages of admission to vocational 
practice when schools of basic vocational education become 
available. The slow, cumbersome, and ill-directed pro- 
cesses of by-education are shortened and the proficiency of 
the individual greatly increased; but, on the other hand, 
social requirements for maturity, general education, and the 
like are increased. Vocational schools have so improved 
the training of nurses, elementary school teachers, dentists, 
pharmacists, stenographers, and assayers that very young 
people could easily qualify for these callings if general 
standards had remained what they were when transitions 
from apprenticeship to school training took place. But 
these standards have themselves steadily risen. 

It has sometimes been thought that trade training, if 
accomplished in schools of basic vocational education rather 
than through apprenticeship, would result in bringing men 
to the stage of journeymanship much earlier than has his- 
torically been the case. Doubtless it would if other require- 
ments did not change. But even the age of entry upon 
apprenticeship has been steadily rising during the last cen- 
tury for all, or nearly all, trades. It is doubtful if the 
substitution of school training even for all of apprenticeship 
in the craft trades (of which complete training probably no 
examples can yet be found) would permanently lower the 
age of entry upon the journeymanship stage. 



314 Vocational Education 

It is hard to discover any vocation in which the effective 
age of entrance would be lowered by provision of direct 
vocational education. But it must be recognized that mod- 
ern methods of manufacture, selling, office work and trans- 
portation offer endless new varieties of possible juvenile 
employment (for present purposes it would be well to 
regard any occupation customarily open to untrained work- 
ers under twenty years of age in large numbers as a juvenile 
occupation). For many of these a few weeks or at most 
a few months specialized training would often be highly 
profitable. The results, superficially considered, might seem 
to involve a lowering of the age of entrance. 

3. Minimum Requirements of General Education No 

one now disputes the right of society to require that each 
individual shall be guaranteed opportunities for at least a 
minimum general education. Equally it is agreed that 
society has the right to require that each individual shall 
give a stated minimum of time to school attendance and 
shall, if humanly practicable, reach a minimum standard of 
proficiency. 

But there exists as yet no substantial agreement on min- 
imum standards. Several factors must be considered. 
What is a reasonable amount, and what the general char- 
acter, of the non-vocational education that society requires? 
What, in the case of different classes of individuals, is the 
amount of general education they can profitably take? To 
what extent, at the least, should parents be expected to sup- 
port their children exclusively as consumers? Is it expe- 
dient that society, in some collective capacity, assist parents 
in the support of their children while the latter are com- 
pleting expected requirements in general education ? 

Educators have not yet so established the valid objectives 
of general education beyond the primary grades that min- 
imum standards can be defined in terms of their actual 
worth. We can easily insist on minimum essentials in read- 



The Administration of Vocational Education 315 

ing, writing, spelling, and perhaps arithmetic; but when we 
say that fifth grade or eighth grade standards must be met 
we are imposing requirements in terms of purely conven- 
tional norms, the validity of which is as yet far from having 
been determined. Certainly before even the dull and unin- 
terested of our youth are permitted to leave behind them 
all opportunities for general education (physical, social, and 
cultural) they should have reached required levels and 
varieties of knowledge and habit (would that we could say 
appreciation and ideal as well) in hygiene, civics, geography, 
literature, American history, and English speech. But how 
can we define, let alone really evaluate, these requirements ? 
The problem is still before all educators who are not to be 
contented with purely traditional standards. For the pres- 
ent the low limits in our progressive states are set at the 
age of fourteen and the fifth grade. In other words, no one 
may leave the general school (or enter a vocational school) 
until after the fourteenth birthday has been reached, and 
the fifth grade passed. But it is felt by many that these 
requirements are too low. Too low for what? For the 
individual? or for society? Faith answers, '' for both," but 
faith is a poor judge in these matters. It is too apt to be 
charged with soft sentimentalism. 

One aspect of the difficulty is found in our inability as 
yet to say how much education, at least as defined in terms 
of school studies, given individuals can " take on." A 
large percentage of retarded pupils now constitute a mourn- 
ful reality in our elementary schools. What would or could 
these get from longer attendance? It is of doubtful worth, 
either to society or to the individuals concerned, that a lot 
of slow, uninterested pupils be forced to attend school 
between the ages of fourteen and sixteen unless the school 
can give them some kind of profitable training and instruc- 
tion (that is, for civic and cultural purposes). 

Before we can dogmatically decide upon minimum stand- 



3i6 Vocational Education 

ards of general education required to be met before voca- 
tional specialization is begun, we must, clearly, work towards 
better determination of valid objectives, so defined as to 
indicate desirable and practicable grades as related to known 
degrees of native ability or learning power. 

But there are other very important factors which must 
affect standards of minimum general education. Society 
is now organized on the basis of parental support of chil- 
dren. The American standard of living requires that the 
father, and, until the children can help, the father only, 
shall be the wage-earner for the family group. The size of 
the normal family is decreasing, but social economists tell 
us that in social groups that are not undergoing social 
degeneration the normal family must contain from four to 
six children. If the father must support these wholly as 
consumers until, say fourteen years of age, the measure of 
his economic responsibility is easily computed. Farmers, 
small store keepers, and a few others are still able to enlist 
the economic cooperation of children from six to fifteen 
years of age outside of school hours; but other workers 
cannot. What shall determine reasonable limits to the 
economic responsibilities of parents under these conditions? 
We may not, except at our peril, either unduly sacrifice the 
size of the family or impose upon the burden-bearing powers 
of the father. 

If we are ready to adopt a wholly new type of social 
policy, then, of course, the problem alters fundamentally. 
We may collectively assist parents — all, or at least those 
most needing it — to carry the burden of non-productive 
children giving their working hours to school between the 
ages of fourteen and eighteen. At least we might do it for 
the families of most promising children — as is sometimes 
done in England by means of " supporting " scholarships. 
But here we enter upon very new lines of public policy, 
before undertaking which we certainly need better estimates 



The Administration of Vocational Education 317 

than we now possess of the actual vakies, to the individual 
and to society, of the kinds of education, cultural, civic, and 
vocational, which we can give to different classes of youth 
from fourteen years of age upward. 

4. General and Vocational Education Combined. Finally 

it is clear that the proper " age of beginning " vocational 
education is also affected by our policies towards the sep- 
aration or combination of the two types of objectives. We 
can, for practical purposes, assume that each youth has 
available for educational work between the ages of fourteen 
and twenty-two from five to eight hours daily, for two 
hundred to three hundred days yearly. These working 
hours can be given either to vocational education, general 
education, vocational productive practice, or a combination 
of the three, or any two. Outside of working hours the 
youth has leisure hours for physical, cultural, and social 
recreation, and for rest. In his leisure hours he will con- 
tinue to grow physically, culturally, and socially; and these 
hours can be used to further liberal education of the " beta " 
or B class type. 

Let us assume the case of a youth normally due to enter, 
at the age of twenty, a vocation for which two years of full 
"working" time, basic school vocational education are 
ordinarily required. Among possible courses open to him 
the following are typical. He may devote all his working 
time up to the age of eighteen to procuring a general educa- 
tion and then give his full time for two years to obtaining a 
vocational education. Or, between the ages of sixteen and 
twenty, he may give half his time to vocational, and half to 
general education. Under the first conditions, he would 
begin what would be called his vocational education at 
eighteen ; under the second conditions, at sixteen. 

Which course will give best results ? Obviously we need to 
know what we mean by " best," and how we rank the pos- 
sible vocational education of these years with general educa- 



3i8 Vocational Education 

tion in individual and social values. The present writer is 
emphatically of the opinion that when we shall have actually 
determined the valid objectives of school vocational educa- 
tion, for such callings as those of the dentist, shoe salesman, 
type B general farmer, elementary school teacher, plumber, 
machine shop foreman, house carpenter, cotton mill weaver, 
and hundreds of others, we shall find it impracticable to 
provide that working hours shall be used on a " blended " 
program. We shall discover that acceptable results can 
be procured only by programs providing for close concen- 
tration and part-time adjustments with productive work and 
involving a corresponding shortening of the period to be 
devoted exclusively to vocational education. A similar re- 
quirement will be that as much time as practicable be re- 
served for full-time liberal education. 

IV 

Labor Unions and Vocational Education To educators 

as well as laymen, the probable future development of voca- 
tional schools seems to be very much conditioned by the 
attitude of " labor," organized and unorganized. It is sub- 
mitted that experience to date justifies the following con- 
clusions : 

1. The general attitude of the best informed leaders of 
organized labor is clearly expressed in the following state- 
ment made by President Gompers (quoted from Manual 
Training and Vocational Education Magazine, Vol. 16, 
p. 329) : 

" In 1904 another committee on education was appointed, and again in 
1905 another committee, and again in 1906. In 1907 the A. F. of L. at 
its annual convention resolved that * we do endorse any policy or any 
society (this I may state included and had special reference to the 
National Society for the Promotion of Industrial Education) or associa- 
tion, having for its object the raising of the standard of industrial edu- 
cation and the teaching of the higher technic of our various indus- 
tries.' 



The Administration of Vocational Education 319 

" The committee to which this resolution was referred reported it 
* decided to record itself in favor of the best opportunities for the most 
complete and best industrial and technical training obtainable/ and it 
recommended an investigation of industrial school systems. 

" In 1906 the committee on education attested * with satisfaction the 
splendid progress accomplished by the Executive Council along the lines 
of industrial education,' and submitted to the convention a set of reso- 
lutions in which it stated that * industrial education is necessary and 
inevitable for the progress of an industrial people.' 

" Industrial education was before the convention of 1909, at which 
time I myself stated in my report that the A. F. of L. favored public 
industrial education, and opposed only narrowly specialized training 
under the control of private interests. Organized labor has always 
opposed and will continue to oppose sham industrial education, whether 
at public or private expense. It has opposed and will continue to 
oppose that superficial training which confers no substantial benefit 
upon the worker, which does not make him a craftsman, but only an 
interloper, who may be available in times of crisis, perhaps, as a strike 
breaker, but not as a trained artisan for industrial service at other times. 
Industrial education must train men for work, not for private and sinis- 
ter corporation purposes. 

" I refer to this by way of explaining what it is that has at times in 
the past aroused labor's opposition to what has been unfairly called 
industrial education. It will be found that wherever labor has opposed 
what has been put forth as industrial education, the enterprise called 
industrial education has been something entirely different from what 
Richmond is instituting in its public school to-day. 

" To the 1909 convention of the American Federation of Labor I 
took pleasure in submitting this : * That since technical education of the 
workers in trade and industry is a public necessity it should not be a 
private, but a public function, conducted by the public and the expense 
involved at public cost.' You people in Richmond are doing to-day 
precisely what the committee of the A. F. of L. recommended five years 
ago should be done. 

" In 1911 the A. F. of L. came forward in support of a bill in Con- 
gress providing for national aid in establishing vocational education in 
the public schools of the country. Since that date up to the present time 
the A. F. of L. has consistently, persistently, and unremittingly advo- 
cated the establishment of industrial education in the public schools." 

2. But, in the actual processes of establishing vocational 
schools in a given community or state, opposition is fre- 
quently encountered, due to the following causes : 

a. Employees suspect that employers are interested in 
vocational training primarily to the end of making available 



320 Vocational Education 

a supply of labor to be used in time of strike or other 
difficulty. 

h. Where a trade is in process of decomposition, special- 
ized processes being substituted for " all-round " processes 
— carpentry in large centers, printing (of books and news- 
papers), clothing making, machine shop practice, glass 
manufacture, and many others — organized trade workers 
greatly fear the employment of " short " intensive courses 
in vocational schools to produce specialist operatives who 
will take work at reduced wages. 

c. When educators have succeeded in establishing in a 
given community one or a few types of apparently success- 
ful vocational training, there is danger that an excessive 
number of learners will crowd into these lines, and so 
greatly disturb conditions in that center. 

d. Laborers in skilled trades often allege that the voca- 
tional school, as thus far developed, cannot teach skills ac- 
cording to desirable standards of efficiency as maintained by 
these trades. 

3. But labor unions have almost never opposed estab- 
lishment of extension instruction or training for persons 
already employed as apprentices or assistants. Opposition 
is expressed chiefly against trade training that precedes 
apprenticeship. 

4. Supporters of vocational education often urge labor- 
ers to second their efforts on the ground that the children of 
the laborers themselves will be the chief beneficiaries of free 
opportunities for vocational training.* But these well-meant 
suggestions often fail to elicit sympathetic response for the 
reason that very frequently artisan and other organized 
workers do not desire their children to follow occupationally 
in the footsteps of their fathers. To a large extent in 
America, and in fact as part of what '' Americanism " means 
to many in the way of freedom of opportunity to advance, 
parents desire their sons and daughters, the more capable at 



The Administration of Vocational Education 321 

least, to work into " higher " or " better " occupations than 
those followed by their parents. Unskilled manual workers 
try to get their children into skilled industrial or semi- 
skilled commercial occupations; skilled industrial workers 
aspire to have their children in commercial occupations, 
teaching, and lower grades of public service; while pros- 
perous farmers, artisans, and commercial workers develop 
ambitions that their most capable children shall prepare for 
the professions or for the more profitable commercial call- 
ings. Hence the appeal to organized laborers to consider 
their own children often fails of response; they have con- 
sidered their own children, but not as candidates for their 
fathers' kinds of vocations. 

5. Notwithstanding the occasional selfishness or panic 
of organized labor, it is probable that when a sincere, well- 
planned, and properly supervised program of vocational 
education shall have been evolved in a community, leading 
representatives of labor having been freely consulted in the 
process, such labor will not persist in opposition. As a rule 
the civic interest and Americanism of really influential labor 
men is more basic than their specific devotion to unionism 
or their natural desires artificially to protect their own field 
of employment. 

Disposal of Product. — The ideal vocational school should, 
in the opinion of best authorities, have its students working 
from the start on a commercial product, control of which lies 
wholly within the school. But, obviously, the practicability 
of this will vary greatly according to the vocation for which 
training is being given. 

Where the possible product is of a kind that can profit- 
ably be produced in small shops it is easy for the school to 
equip and maintain such a shop of its own. This should 
be easy in such fields as the manufacturing of children's 
and men's clothing, fruit packing, furniture making, shoe- 
making, printing, and various forms of repair work, — 



322 Vocational Education 

shoe, automobile, trunk, blacksmithing, etc. But where 
manufacture has developed a very large and costly organiza- 
tion as the productive unit of maximum effectiveness it may 
prove beyond the powers of the school to provide its own 
plant. No school, probably, could have its own shop for the 
manufacture of steel rails, cannon, automobiles, locomotives, 
ships, glass, or cement. It is questionable whether a school 
could manage successfully in the production of watches, 
pottery, brick, electric appliances, leather, packed meats, 
cotton cloth, jewelry, books and newspapers, and pressed 
metal ware. It would probably not prove feasible for a 
vocational school for the railway trades to own its own rail- 
road in competition wtih private enterprise, but if the govern- 
ment were the controlling agency in railway traffic certain 
sections or branches of the system of a given area could be 
transferred to the control of vocational schools whereon 
commercial service could be rendered. 

In farming, fishing, coal-mining, and ship transportation 
a vocational school can certainly provide the management 
to make commercially successful the farms, fishing equip- 
ment, coal mines, and ships that such schools might own 
and use. That examples of such control in the past have 
not always proven successful cannot be denied; and that the 
attempts of vocational schools to manage these large enter- 
prises will always be accompanied by considerable risks, is 
unquestionable. But, in some cases at least, no satisfactory 
alternative may be found. The United States government, 
in providing vocational schools for aviators, has not hesi- 
tated to employ extensive equipment, although, of course, 
it has been under no obligation to deliver a commercial out- 
put as an immediate by-product of its training processes. 

In house carpentry and probably in other trades of build- 
ing or installation — including road building, forestation, 
and under some circumstances, conceivably, boat building, 
.street paving, orchard planting, etc. — experience seems to 



The Administration of Vocational Education 323 

have shown that if a " revolving " fund is given the school 
wherewith it may purchase the needed land, materials, and 
tools required to erect a house (or build a boat, or section of 
road, plant an orchard, etc. ) , after which the finished product 
is sold and the revolving fund replenished from the pro- 
ceeds, most satisfactory results will be secured. Here again, 
obviously, very good management is essential but the bur- 
den of such management is not an undesirable or unprofit- 
able one to impose upon the genuine vocational school. 

Where productive enterprise is still conducted on a small 
scale — farming, gardening, stockraising, homemaking, 
child nursing, cooking, laundry work, small store retail 
selling, and especially where the learners are usually able 
to work with equipment belonging to parents — it is doubt- 
ful whether the school should try to conduct independent 
productive enterprises. In these cases the best work of the 
school will probably be accomplished by providing for the 
organization of productive work at the home or at a place of 
" apprentice " employment — e.g. child nursing or laundry 
— and then linking up technical instruction, on a part-time 
basis, with such home practice. Certainly this method gives 
largest promise in agricultural education and, obviously, 
homemaking offers the most extensive field for its develop- 
ment. 

Proceeds from Productive Work. — In the administration 
of vocational schools where a commercial product is made 
and sold, the disposition of the proceeds involves many 
knotty problems. The following are submitted as essential 
principles : 

1. It is freely accepted that all sound vocational educa- 
tion involves the doing of concrete productive work, using 
for this purpose the appropriate special equipment and ma- 
terials suited to the trade being learned. Examples: (a) 
A boy learning agriculture must raise a valuable product from 
the soil, using farmers' tools, {h) A boy learning print- 



324 Vocational Education 

ing should individually, or as a member of a group, do a 
substantial amount of printing, (c) A girl learning cook- 
ing as one of the arts of homemaking should prepare sub- 
stantial amounts of valuable food, using kitchen, kitchen 
equipment, and food materials. 

2. Productive work in a vocational school is never a 
primary end in itself. Education in the occupation con- 
cerned is the primary end. Productive work is to be re- 
garded as a by-product, and a necessary by-product. It can- 
not, however, be truly productive work unless it has value, 
unless it is capable of being sold. Make-believe work, toys, 
and the like, do not constitute true productive work. It is 
not expected, of course, that the productive work produced 
by learners will be of first quality. On the other hand, it 
cannot be tolerated that it should be of unsalable quality. 

3. The time of teachers or pupils in State-aided voca- 
tional schools should never be devoted to productive work 
for its own sake. To do this involves a misdirection of 
State and local money. School authorities must decide 
when the law of diminishing returns operates as regards 
education through productive work, and terminate such 
work at this point. Hence it may always be assumed that 
the productive work of a properly managed vocational school 
will be essentially a by-product of educational processes. 

4. The factors of cost in productive work may be con- 
sidered under the following heads : (a) The equipment for 
technical instruction, such as school buildings and general 
equipment, library books, etc. (b) Instruction, and in- 
structor's supervision of productive work, (c) The ma- 
terials and special tools for productive work ; for example : 
Land, horses, hand tools, seed, etc., for gardening; paper, 
printing presses, ink, etc., for printing; lumber, planing ma- 
chines, etc., for cabinet making, (d) Special equipment. 
(e) The labor of pupils. 

5. The special equipment and materials used in produc- 



The Administration of Vocational Education 325 

tive work may be supplied from the following sources: (a) 
The pupil, or the pupil's family, as when a boy uses home 
land and tools for farming ; when a girl uses home kitchen, 
equipment and foodstuff for cooking. {h) The agencies 
maintaining the school, — the school acting as custodian and 
trustee. For example : Community and state, or either, 
may provide land for farming, domestic animals for plow- 
ing or dairying, etc. ; kitchen equipment for commercial 
cooking; printing shop for printing, etc. (c) Private par- 
ties for part-time work. Examples : Owners of machine 
shop offer equipment and tools for pupils to work; owners 
of farms offer land and equipment for gardening, etc. 

6. In determining ownership of productive work, it may 
be assumed that community and state maintaining voca- 
tional schools will not charge against productive work either 
general equipment for technical instruction, or instruction, 
including instructional supervision of pupil's work. Hence 
the two legitimate charges against productive work will be 
for (a) materials and special equipment used in productive 
work, and (J?) labor of pupils. 

7. On the other hand, it should be recognized that, by 
custom and sound theory, the learner himself has no neces- 
sary claim on any part of his productive work. He is seek- 
ing an education. Under an apprenticeship he or his parents 
often pay for such education and get no return for immedi- 
ate productive work. In the older professional vocational 
schools the learner pays and gets no direct return. Hence 
it would not be inexpedient for state and community main- 
taining vocational schools to insist that any surplus of value 
created by productive work after cost of materials and 
special equipment has been met, should be retained by state 
and community. 

8. But it may prove expedient, pedagogically, to allow 
pupils to share, under some conditions, in part or all of the 
products of their productive work. This should be deter- 
mined by experience. The following are special cases : 



326 Vocational Education 

9. Where the pupil or his parents supply substantially all 
of the materials and special equipment, the pupil and his par- 
ents might well absorb the surplus value. For example, a 
boy obtains from his father land, tools, seed, etc., for gar- 
dening; a girl obtains from her mother kitchen equipment, 
foodstuffs, etc., for cooking; a girl obtains for herself, or 
in her home, dress goods, sewing machine, etc., for dress- 
making. 

In all these cases it might prove expedient for a pupil to 
retain net value of product created. 

10. An employer offers shops and equipment for indus- 
trial education. He is entitled, of course, to costs of ma- 
terials, fair rent for equipment, and usual managerial prof- 
its. A surplus over might be returned, in the shape of 
wages, to the pupils, or net product might be divided between 
pupils and school (it being understood, of course, that the 
school is regarded only as trustee, it having been assumed at 
the start that the school has no inherent right as a definitive 
organization to any share in productive work). 

11. When the school itself undertakes productive work, 
the value created does not belong to the school but to the 
agencies maintaining the school, the school acting as trustee. 
Hence, out of value of product may be paid: (a) Cost of 
materials (returned to school appropriation from which 
payments have been made) ; (b) Rent, to community for 
special equipment (as distinguished from general instruc- 
tional equipment) for particular work; (c) Wages to 
pupils; (d) Surplus, divided between agencies maintain- 
ing instruction. 

12. It has been urged, and there are precedents for the 
following claims under some circumstances where materials 
and special equipment are supplied by or through the school : 
(a) That the pupil might retain the product created by 
himself. (This has frequently been done in manual training 
and cooking schools. In industrial schools it may appear 



The Administration of Vocational Education 327 

desirable that it should be done in the case of those wood 
products, like furniture, which fit easily into the home, or 
clothing, which could be used by the family, or even agri- 
cultural products raised on the school farm.) {h) That the 
valuable product should be retained by the school itself, as 
a part of its upbuilding equipment, (c) That the valuable 
product should be retained by the city or town maintaining 
the school. 

13. As regards retention of product by pupils, in case 
materials and equipment are supplied by or through the. 
school, the following are grounds for believing it inexpedi- 
ent and undesirable, {a) There is no necessary relationship 
between factors of cost of materials (including tools used) 
and labor of pupils, in the value of product. Under some 
circumstances the value of the materials may constitute 75% 
or 80% of the value of a product, — under others, only 
10% or 15%. If the pupils retain product, the temptation 
is to exploit the school by asking for more valuable mate- 
rials. (6) Inonly a few lines of productive work is the prod- 
uct itself of any value to the pupil. Rarely in electrical work, 
house carpentry, printing, machine shop practice, pattern 
making, and numerous other trades, can the pupil use the 
product. Examples of valuable products created, which 
pupils can use, as thus far known, are found chiefly in 
cabinet-making and dressmaking. Cabinet-making is still 
closely allied to manual training, and it is not certain that 
much of the work done in the study is truly vocational, (c) 
In view of the uncertainty as to whether pupils can use prod- 
uct, if practice is followed of giving pupil product under 
some instances, injustice is done to other pupils. If pupils 
are to share in values created by them, a tmiform policy must 
be followed by which all pupils, in all lines of work, should 
share equally, unless it can be shown that pedagogic incen- 
tive is much more needed in some lines than others, which 
is doubtful, {d) Fundamentally, the chief objection to 



328 Vocational Education 

pupils sharing in work is that the whole thing is put on the 
basis of manual training, and not on the basis of the true 
productive shop. In the commercial shop workers never 
take away the product. If they want samples, they must 
buy them in the market, as other people. 

14. It is undesirable that the school should absorb value 
created through productive work, for the reason, chiefly, 
that this would put a constant premium upon repair work 
and adding to equipment in the school, instead of compelling 
the school to produce for a market and to meet the condi- 
tions of the market. Patch-work construction about the 
school often comes perilously near to the old exercise 
method, where students built little brick walls, or set up 
dummy walls for electrical apparatus, and then tore them 
down again. Furthermore, not all lines of trade give work 
that can be used in the school. 

15. It is undesirable, also, that the community maintain- 
ing the school should absorb value of product created, ex- 
cept a due share for rent of special equipment supplied by 
community only. Town and state should create a revolv- 
ing fund, and town and state should share in net returns 
from productive work, even if this operates towards re- 
duction of cost of instruction. 

16. Hence, the simple principles to be followed in reim- 
bursement might be the following: (a) Special equipment 
for productive work shall be supplied by town, (b) All 
materials to be consumed in productive work shall be sup- 
plied from the maintenance fund, (c) The school shall be 
regarded as the holder or trustee on behalf of the town and 
state, of all values created by productive work, (d) Prod- 
ucts created by productive work may be sold to : ( 1 ) pupils, 
(2) pupils' famiHes, (3) school, (4) town, or (5) private 
parties. But in all cases these must be regarded as buyers 
on an equal footing. A market price must be established 
for the product, which is a fair price, quality being consid- 



The Administration of Vocational Education 329 

ered, but not of such a nature as to disturb market levels 
of price. 

17. The proceeds of productive work shall be divided as 
follows: (a) Rent may be paid to the town for special 
equipment used, {h) Wages may, if desired, be paid to 
pupils on the basis of agreed-upon terms, (c) Net re- 
maining amount shall be credited equally to State and town, 
as co-partners in maintaining the school. 

Cooperative Preparatory Vocational Education Very 

great difficulties will always be encountered by vocational 
preparatory {i.e. basic vocational) schools in providing 
practice work on a commercial basis. A fully equipped 
school for this purpose will usually involve large expendi- 
tures of capital for equipment and endless difficulties of en- 
try of product into commercial markets. Where the school 
is training for public service, as in army, navy, teaching, 
experiment station service in higher phases of agriculture, 
etc., difficulties are not so great. 

Hence wherever practicable, vocational education should 
be organized on cooperative basis, the school giving those 
phases, technical and social especially, for which it is pecul- 
iarly fitted, and the student obtaining practical experience 
under commercial conditions. By almost universal consent, 
this represents pedagogical practice of maximum potency, 
if cooperative arrangements can be effectively made. But 
such cooperation will involve great difficulties, unless cer- 
tain types of organization are effected. 

1. Experience thus far seems to indicate that under the 
following conditions cooperation is most easily practicable : 

(a) Where a farm is owned by an individual farmer, not 
working in a definite organization, the detachment of suffi- 
cient land and equipment for a comparatively practicable 
farm for the boy seems to be feasible. 

(h) Where an industry or commercial establishment is 
managed on a very large scale so that space, equipment, and 



33^ Vocational Education 

even supervision can be detached in sufficient quantity to 
justify the maintenance of a class of pupils, here again, co- 
operative arrangements are easily feasible. 

(c) In vocational homemaking, use of the girl's home for 
vocational purposes ought to prove entirely practicable. 

2. Under the following conditions, cooperative work thus 
far seems to be fraught with much difficulty : 

(a) Where a highly organized industry cannot afford to 
detach separate space, equipment, and supervision, for a 
vocational class, and hence where school pupils, if intro- 
duced at all, must be introduced as individuals alongside of 
experienced workers, thus greatly complicating supervision. 

(b) The teacher coming from a public school system, 
and being obliged to take charge of a room rather than serve 
as an assistant foreman. 

(c) A boy, not the son of a farmer, having to be placed 
on a farm as a laborer, in which case unintelligent produc- 
tion on gang labor basis may result. 

We need detailed analyses of cooperative possibihties 
under such conditions as presented by: a sailing ship; a 
steamer ; freight-train service ; banking houses ; small stores ; 
department stores; hotels; automobile driving: mining; 
highly organized agriculture ; skilled building trades, etc. 

3. The following are essential conditions to effective 
cooperative vocational education : 

(a) From the outset the general pedagogical plan of ad- 
vancement, sequences of tasks, adjustment of technical to 
practice work, must be provided by the school itself. 

(b) The schools should give a short introductory period 
of practice in order to minimize difficulties of supervision on 
the part of coordinators or shop foremen. 

(c) The schools should also take charge of successive ad- 
vancement in stages and, if necessary, give short introduc- 
tory practice at outset of each. 

(d) No cooperation should be asked for from productive 



The Administration of Vocational Education 331 

agencies unless it can be achieved without economic sacri- 
fice, taking account of overhead service, on their part. Any 
other proposal is uneconomic, and, in the long run, destined 
to failure. 

These conditions require concrete analysis from the stand- 
point of agriculture, counter salesmanship, field salesman- 
ship, secretarial work, house carpentry, the printing shop, 
printing specialties, engine driving, engine firing, station- 
ary engineer, etc. 

Preapprenticeship. — Where vocational education for 
organized trades having well-developed apprenticeship does 
not appear to be feasible, the suggestion naturally arises as 
to why a so-called vocational school should not undertake 
certain preapprenticeship training which will almost inevit- 
ably be along technical rather than practical lines. The 
writer is unable to see why, where apprenticeship is well or- 
ganized, any school vocational education should be required 
under the head of preapprenticeship. Very much better 
that the learner should formally enter early upon his ap- 
prenticeship, after which the vocational school should sup- 
plement by giving opportunities for extension teaching. 

At the present time there is very much needed an analysis 
of all of those industrial pursuits for which apprenticeship 
is still an alleged possibility. It will be found, probably, 
that not only is apprenticeship declining in the main, but 
that the very conditions which once made apprenticeship 
learning practicable are themselves changing. 

Intensive short course work will serve the needs of a vastly 
greater number than can ever profit from systematic ap- 
prenticeship teaching, at least so far as most highly organ- 
ized modern industries are concerned. 

A somewhat illusory objective often urged in connection 
with so-called preapprenticeship training is that of holding 
the pupils longer in school. This is not a worthy objective 
in and of itself. Pupils should be urged to stay in school 



332 Vocational Education 

beyond the compulsory period only in case it is evident that 
the school has something of substantial profit to offer them. 
It will be found in many cases that the period of prolonged 
attendance, especially on the part of pupils somewhat re- 
tarded, becomes a period of semi-idleness in which habits 
of inattention and half-hearted work formed are not offset 
by vigorous play or other spontaneous activity. 

But, as stated elsewhere, it is highly desirable that through- 
out the junior high school period and later if needed, offer- 
ings of vigorous practical arts work should be made, not 
designed necessarily to utilize vocational motives, nor to 
produce anything more than a very moderate degree of vo- 
cational guidance, but primarily for the purpose of insur- 
ing maximum " general " development. 

The Continuation School. — In a few American states, we 
now find beginnings of the continuation school, school at- 
tendance within the working day being called for to an ex- 
tent of from four to eight hours weekly. From the stand- 
point of sound educational theory, there can be little doubt 
that the future holds in store very great opportunities 
for the development of continuation school instruction and 
training. 

It should be understood that German experience in the de- 
velopment of continuation schools will not necessarily serve 
to shed light on American problems. European continua- 
tion schools, in large measure, evolved from the attempts of 
guilds and employers' organizations to provide, under school 
conditions, certain forms of education which they were 
obliged to give as part of apprenticeship. The first continu- 
ation classes were held frequently on Sundays in order to 
give employed children an opportunity to acquire the knowl- 
edge which was insisted on under conditions of apprentice- 
ship. 

In America, many new conditions must be encountered. 
It is by no means yet clear as to how far industry can adapt 



The Administration of Vocational Education 2>:^2> 

itself to conditions where children are away from work 
from four to eight hours weekly. 

Furthermore, programs of continuation school instruc- 
tion are still matters of experimentation. That a small part 
of the education to be given can be of definitely vocational 
character is probably true; but for the majority of pupils, 
it is certain that only a more general form of liberal educa- 
tion, utilizing to the utmost the practical experience that the 
children are obtaining, can be devised. 

The successful prosecution of any form of continuation 
work involves special equipment of shops, laboratories, and 
especially cases where work may be stored during the ab- 
sence of the class. 

Furthermore, in certain fields of cultural and civic edu- 
cation, the continuation school should also make a definite 
new start, connecting such work with the practical experi- 
ence being obtained b}^ the learner. 

The ideal towards which the continuation school must 
strive is to be found in half-time school attendance from 14 
to 18 years, during which abundant opportunity shall be 
given for *' short course " introduction to new occupations 
or for short course transition from lower to higher levels in 
occupations. 

Specially trained teachers — preferably teachers who have 
had some years' experience in day schools, after which they 
have taken the equivalent of at least one-half year's full 
time " graduate " or special training for this work — will 
be indispensable to the success of a continuation school pro- 
gram. In general, only men should teach the boys, and 
women the girls. 

Continuation Schools should be defined to include only 
schools on which attendance is compulsory for a minimum 
of a stated number of hours per week within the ordinary 
working day of young persons regularly employed gain- 
fully. Hence evening schools, part-time vocational schools 



334 Vocational Education 

in which pupils are working in shops to obtain vocational 
experience, or short course schools for voluntary attendance 
are not continuation schools. It will be here assumed that 
a minimum program of continuation school attendance re- 
quires at least four hours weekly for forty weeks yearly be- 
tween the ages of 14-16. 

Courses offered in continuation schools may be of one or 
more of several kinds, — physical, cultural, social, basic 
vocational or extension vocational. It may be assumed 
practically that extension vocational education in continua- 
tion classes is based upon the experience obtained during 
the day in wage-earning work. 

Vocational Aims. — To what extent will it prove prac- 
ticable in practice to offer vocational training in continua- 
tion schools to youths between fourteen and sixteen ? More 
adequate analysis of the experience of the German states, 
and of Denmark, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania is required 
before we can answer this question with confidence; but it 
is the writer's present conviction that such opportunities will 
be found to be fewer than has been supposed. The reasons 
for this supposition are these : The vocations commonly 
followed by youths from 14-16 and to an increasing extent 
from 16-18 are essentially juvenile occupations — that is, 
occupations that are only suited to juvenile workers and that 
are not the normal introductory stages of vocations to be 
followed by adults. This is especially the case with the 
highly specialized industrial and commercial vocations. As- 
sistant homemaking is rarely an organized wage-earning 
calling for girls from 14-16 and it is not yet certain whether 
wage-earning occupations will be available in agriculture 
for boys or girls of these years. Probably small-store 
merchandising offers to-day the most promising field of 
wage-earning employment for youngsters desirous of fol- 
lowing juvenile work into related manhood stages. For 
young store workers, therefore, whether employed as deliv- 



The Administration of Vocational Education 335 

ery boys, assistant sellers, or in other capacities, surveys may 
show that continuation school instruction of an extension 
vocational character may well be profitable. 

To what extent and for what vocations can basic voca- 
tional education be offered to advantage? Our knowledge 
of the vocations available and the most effective means of 
training therefor is altogether insufficient to say, but this 
prediction may be justified. Where systems of basic voca- 
tional training on a four to eight hour weekly schedule are 
brought into competition with full-time, short course voca- 
tional education, the latter will generally win popular ap- 
proval and support. Even eight hours weekly for forty 
weeks could only give the same amount of time that eight 
hours daily would give in forty days. Most young workers 
of families having American standards of living will be 
found able to discontinue wage-earning for thirty to sixty 
days if thereby they can be assured of effective training for 
higher levels of productive work. It is not impossible, in- 
deed, that once legislation assures a working day of moderate 
length to young workers, the compulsory continuation school 
attendance which will probably soon be required in all states 
up to and including even eighteen years of age will be made 
so flexible that the required hours of attendance can be met 
in twenty days of eight hours each as a minimum, thirty 
days of six hours each, or forty days of four hours each. 
This will permit opportunities for intensive short course 
training where it is desired to achieve definite forms of vo- 
cational competency. 

It is probable that the time of continuation school attend- 
ance between the ages of 14 and 16 will be utilized chiefly 
for purposes of liberal, cultural, and social education. With 
the practical experience obtained daily by young wage-work- 
ers, even four hours weekly can be made of great service in 
ripening and extending general education. To some ex- 
tent, too, this time can be well used for purposes of physical 



336 Vocational Education 

education ; but for that purpose we shall need programs and 
teachers very different from those now available. 

Compulsory Vocational Education Even when it is 

urged that school attendance on a full-time or part-time 
basis shall be made obligatory up to eighteen years of age, 
it is not yet suggested that vocational education shall be 
made obligatory. Our knowledge of the desirable and 
possible objectives of vocational education is too vague as 
yet for that. What are principles of desirable and expedi- 
ent action as regards obligatory vocational education ? It is 
now regarded as no undue infringement of individual rights 
to compel acquisition of education in literacy. Will a simi- 
lar social attitude ultimately be taken as respects minimum 
vocational competency? The following considerations are 
important : 

1. The primary object of the state or of society in its col- 
lective capacity in promoting effective vocational education 
may be considered to be the safety of the state itself. But 
the security and effectiveness of the state can be achieved 
only by means of individuals who are in themselves effective 
physically, vocationally, civically, and culturally. Further- 
more, the function of the state, in the last analysis, is the pro- 
motion of the well-being of the individuals composing it, 
and under these circumstances, vocational education may be 
considered also from the standpoint of its possible contri- 
butions to individual well-being. 

In promoting the well-being of individuals, it is a funda- 
mental principle that state action or other corporate action 
takes place only when the competency of the individual him- 
self or of those immediately responsible for him proves in- 
sufficient to guarantee an optimum of the conditions making 
for such well-being. By universal consent, then, the state 
seeks to guarantee a protected childhood to every person 
born into society, this protection extending even to the point 
of removing the child from his parents or natural guardians 



The Administration of Vocational Education 337 

in case their incompetency can be established. The ideal 
of a protected childhood is also realized through compulsory 
education, through prohibition of labor of young people 
except under stated conditions, and through guarantee of 
certain opportunities for growth and development such as 
playgrounds and freedom of movement. 

It now becomes public policy also to include under the 
general designation of a protected childhood such a start 
towards economic independence as the state itself can in- 
sure in the event that the family and individual themselves 
prove unable to satisfy these needs. Elsewhere it has been 
shown that under modern conditions of industry, especially 
in large centers, the family and industry are proving less and 
less able to insure either adequate vocational guidance or, 
more important, sufficient vocational training, to constitute 
for given individuals what might reasonably be called a fair 
start in life. 

The welfare of the individual must be considered from 
the following standpoints : a young person born into society 
represents, economically speaking, a liability during his first 
fourteen to twenty-two years according to the prevailing 
standard of living and the calling for which he is to be fitted. 
Thenceforward, as long as properly employed, the individ- 
ual produces a surplus of economic goods until illness or 
the decrepitude of age begins, when his productive capacity 
declines, finally reaching the zero point and thereafter, eco- 
nomically speaking again, the individual becomes a liability 
to society. Collectively speaking, the individuals of society 
must, during their period of productivity, produce not only 
sufficient for their own maintenance, but a surplus sufficient 
to meet the needs of young and old dependents, the needs of 
non-producers in society who must be carried (dehnquents, 
defectives, chronically ill, etc.), and also such an amount 
as may be necessary to add to the capital, both fixed and 
mobile, of society. 



338 Vocational Education 

It is clear that through proper training in skill, related 
knowledge and vision, the individual enhances his productive 
capacity. Reference must again be had to the fact that the 
total productivity of the individual is dependent upon many 
other factors besides his individual skill or possession of 
technical knowledge, such as the current state of inventions, 
the presence of natural resources, the presence of initiating 
powers, the type of prevailing organization in industry, etc. 
Of these, of course, the skill and technical knowledge of the 
individual are the elements that are most completely within 
his own control. The others, to a large extent, are a part 
of the natural or social inheritance with reference to which 
the individual is in a considerable degree helpless. 

Under modern conditions of production involving large 
amounts of technical knowledge and organization of indus- 
try, we can assume that the proportion of unskilled labor 
that can be used, or of those who can bring to work only 
physical strength, is diminishing rather than increasing. 
Some of the factors here involved are confessedly obscure 
and until the supply of technically qualified labor in any 
given field is demonstrably larger than the demand, we 
shall have to take the position that the training of those who 
would otherwise be unskilled becomes permanently a source 
of increased productiveness. 

2. Apart from increase of economic productiveness the 
vocational education of the individual may be considered 
also in reference to his welfare as contributing materials to 
his joy in work, conservation of health and strength, open- 
ing opportunities for leadership, making for thrift and sav- 
ings, lessening the deadening effects of routine work and 
giving certain important cultural derivatives from the work 
itself. All of these may be regarded as important and nec- 
essary factors in the well-being of the individual and prob- 
ably to be achieved most effectively through a broad and 
rightly directed vocational education. 



The Administration of Vocational Education 339 

3. Granted social provision of ample opportunities for 
vocational education, it may be assumed that from seventy 
to ninety per cent of all persons will in due season take 
reasonable advantage of such opportunities. It would cer- 
tainly be sound policy to force the remainder, even if at a 
belated period, to come under a regime of compulsory at- 
tendance and obligatory learning of a vocation, much as we 
now require youthful prisoners in juvenile reform schools 
and reformatories to " learn a trade," where it is evident 
that other agencies do not make provision for such educa- 
tion. 

V 

The Junior High School is undoubtedly rapidly evolving 
and being approved as a new type of school in American edu- 
cation. Its probable relation to vocational education is not 
yet clearly defined. It seems expedient therefore to analyze 
some of its salient features in detail. 

Proposals for the junior high school type of school or- 
ganization are chiefly, as yet, proposals for administrative 
readjustments. We hear, as yet, very little regarding prob- 
able pedagogical changes — in courses of instruction and 
methods of teaching as now desired or expected in the upper 
grades. In large measure the new type of organization is 
sought simply as a means — in the minds of many persons 
an indispensable means — of attaining the educational goals 
which, long ago, we set ourselves for children in upper 
grades, and in some cases for all children over twelve years 
of age. 

1. The existing type of organization as found in almost 
any urban community in the United States is usually as fol- 
lows : 

(a) The elementary school consists of eight or nine 
grades, children in which, ranging from five to about fifteen 
years, are all housed in one school building ; 



340 Vocational Education 

(b) From one fifth to one third of the pupils twelve years 
of age and upward are found retarded in grades below the 
seventh, competing with younger and, as a rule, brighter 
children. 

(c) The grade teachers teach all subjects in grades be- 
low the seventh ; and in the seventh and eighth, all but man- 
ual training for boys and household arts for girls and, oc- 
casionally, music and drawing, which are taught depart- 
mentally; while in perhaps three to five per cent, only, of all 
schools are fairly comprehensive systems of departmental 
teaching found. 

(d) The upper grade teachers are women, with in- 
creasingly rare exceptions; these women have not had spe- 
cial training for upper grade work, but are, as a rule, the 
abler of the teachers, who obtained their first experience in 
country schools or lower grades (upper grade positions fre- 
quently carry better salaries, and are therefore sought by 
women who expect to remain permanently in teaching). 

(e) The course of study is uniform for all pupils alike, 
except for the differentiation of manual training for boys, 
and household arts for girls; its primary elements being: 
English language, English literature, geography, American 
history, and arithmetic; while hygiene, science, drawing, 
music, manual arts, civics, etc., are secondary or incidental 
elements, foreign language and vocational guidance being 
rare elements. 

(/) Standards of graduation are determined almost 
wholly by the prevailing standards of admission to high 
school; hence, as a rule, less than fifty per cent of all pupils 
required to attend school obtain the elementary diploma. 

2. The school organization which is urged as being more 
effective — namely, the junior high school — should have 
the following features : 

(a) All children from five to twelve (except children 
under twelve who have finished the sixth grade) should be 



The Administration of Vocational Education 341 

taught in schools located near their homes (schools which in 
cities need not exceed four or five rooms in size), staffed 
by women teachers only. 

{h) These lower elementary schools should never be 
very large — ten or twelve rooms would be a desirable maxi- 
mum — and the principal should be simply a head teacher ; 
but for each fifty to seventy teachers in these schools in any 
community there should be a woman supervisor of instruc- 
tion. 

(c) All children between twelve and fifteen years of age 
(including children under twelve ready for the seventh 
grade, and excluding children under fifteen ready for the 
regular or senior high school) should be sent to the central 
junior high school or intermediate school (it should be 
assumed that a walk of one and one half, or even two, 
miles is not excessive for this purpose). 

{d) Promotion should, as far as practicable, be by subject 
so that a retarded pupil, for example, in the fourth grade in 
arithmetic may, if qualified, enter seventh grade geography; 
and a boy backward in history may nevertheless take eighth 
grade industrial arts (manual training) if qualified. 

{e) The course of study in the central school should 
offer the pupils a large range of elective or optional studies 
in addition to certain essentials in English language, Eng- 
lish literature, American history, community civics, and 
geography which should be prescribed for all ( for retarded 
pupils special classes in these subjects to be formed), 

(/) Teaching in the junior high school is expected to be 
departmentally organized by subjects, or, preferably, along 
lines of the Gary plan, by groups of related subjects; and it 
is expected that this organization will produce a demand for 
specially qualified teachers. 

{g) If the state is willing to pay the price, a certain pro- 
portion of men teachers should be assigned to departmental 
positions, not primarily because they are necessarily better 



342 Vocational Education 

teachers than women, but because it is desirable to introduce, 
in boys' classes at any rate, the influence of masculine per- 
sonality. 

Those of us who favor such reorganization of education 
as will give us the six-three-three plan or the six-two-four 
plan — with the junior and senior high schools either as 
two and four year or three and three year schools respec- 
tively, and in any event as large central schools — do so 
because we believe that, on the whole, the psychological 
conditions of children as well as their social needs justify 
such reorganization, even if it cost the community slightly 
more financially. What are those conditions, and what are 
these needs ? 

1. The conditions are summed up in the two words " in- 
creasing variability." Uniform programs of education, 
uniform teaching methods, and non-specialized teachers pre- 
suppose groups of people of substantially uniform charac- 
teristics. But all recent inquiries tend to bring into relief 
facts as to the increasing unlikeness of children beyond 
twelve years of age. We recognize them as differing mod- 
erately as regards height, weight, and bodily strength; 
materially as regards abilities in such studies as literature, 
vernacular language, and history; and very greatly indeed 
as regards abilities and interests in music, plastic and 
graphic art, abstract mathematics, foreign language, and 
manual constructive work. 

We should not, of course, fall into the foolish error some- 
times made in educational writings, of supposing that these 
differences are greater (whatever that may mean) than are 
the resemblances or likenesses in the case of any two chil- 
dren. Two children of twelve may differ in height by as 
much as fifteen inches, but almost never do they differ by 
twenty-five per cent of the height of the shorter. No two 
children differ as much in respect to ability to learn a for- 
eign language as either one does from a horse or other 



The Administration of Vocational Education 343 

animal as respects such learning. In the absolute sense, 
therefore, it may be repeated, the facts of resemblance 
among young human beings (as regards the elements that 
make groups of them relatively homogeneous) are vastly 
more numerous and significant than are the facts of unlike- 
ness. But as regards the facts of likeness and unlikeness 
that are important to education, to the ends and purposes 
for which schools exist, all evidence points to the desirability 
and essential humaneness of all arrangements, which permit, 
in processes of instruction and training, recognition of deep- 
seated differences of ability, taste, and general educability. 

Let us now make two general propositions as to which 
there will be no serious debate. 

(a) If, possessed of endless resources and hampered by 
no restrictions of any kind, we were making educational 
programs for our children, we would doubtless, in light of 
what we now know regarding the unlikeness of individuals 
among them, make the programs for no two of them exactly 
alike in all respects. We would pay tribute to obvious 
differences as regards the gifts bestowed by the gods of 
heredity and early environment; and we would not ignore 
the probable opportunities and limitations decreed by fortune 
in the child's future life. We would strengthen some of 
his already strong powers; and where he was weak we 
might justly forego to strive for the powers for the founda- 
tion of which nature has done so little. 

{h) On the other hand, except in rare cases of genius 
or defect, it is not practicable to educate children on the 
basis of strictly individual qualifications. In education, as 
in war, industry, transportation, worship, housing, and enter- 
tainment, economy and general efficiency require that we 
deal with people in squads, platoons, and divisions. We 
must have companies and regiments for fighting; congre- 
gations for worship; gangs, crews, and departments in 
industry; audiences and parties for entertainment; passen- 



344 Vocational Education 

ger groups and classes for transportation; and grades and 
classes in schools. To talk of individual instruction, except 
as that is practicable within group organization, is to talk 
nonsense, except where the few children of wealth and rank 
are concerned. We can, of course, strive to produce the 
maximum of individual thought, initiative, and action on 
the part of the learner in the class, just as we can on the 
part of the unit in the squad, crew, congregation, audience, 
or passenger group. But it is clear that individuality of 
action in these groups must, while the ends of group action 
or reception are to be met, be greatly subordinated to the 
requirements of subjection to orders and enforced limita- 
tions, uniformity of stimuli, and conformity in behavior. 

In the organization of groups for school education, there- 
fore, we cannot, though we would, provide special programs 
for each individual (as men and women did for Helen 
Keller). We must provide for a certain amount of regi- 
mentation, classification, grouping. But these groupings 
must not be fixed in rigid groups. We must not allow the 
school to become a Procrustean bedstead to an extent greater 
than is absolutely necessary and inevitable. We have had 
the school compared to a saw mill, cutting its " stock " into 
standardized lengths. Schools have done this in the past. 
Like armies, churches, and transportation, schools have at 
times made the organization of groups an end rather than a 
means, forgetting that the units with which they deal are 
in considerable measure unlike. 

2. Besides the psychological " conditions " of the indi- 
viduals composing our school classes, what are their social 
" needs " that justify the proposed reorganizations of upper 
grade work? The keynote to these needs will be found in 
the words " progressively increasing differentiation." Mod- 
ern civilized life is like modern industry or modern army 
organization. Functions are being increasingly differen- 
tiated, and activities and interests specialized according to 
all kinds of capacities and opportunities. 



The Administration of Vocational Education 345 

But it should be clear at the outset that as regards fitting 
individuals for group life the school has two different func- 
tions, which are at times in conflict. The groups into which 
children must fit are of various kinds. There are large 
groups and small groups — as (a) the nation, the reHgious 
denomination, the political party, the potential army of 
defense, the readers of good books, the economic organiza- 
tion; and, opposed to these, {h) the local community, the 
particular church or sect, the political gang, the squad or 
mess, the partisans of a particular book or writer, the 
embattled employees of a particular industrial establishment. 
There are vocational, as against cultural, groups — farmers, 
machinists, bankers, teachers, waitresses, homemakers, and 
defenders, as against patrons of art, readers of classic liter- 
ature, subscribers to specified magazines, visitors to the 
" movies," illiterates, etc. Various other groupings may be 
distinguished — such as family groups, racial groups, so- 
ciability groups, economic cooperative groups, worshiping 
groups, etc. 

Now it is one of the functions of education to predispose 
and fit its pupils for assimilation with the larger, as against 
the smaller, groups, in the interest of a wholesome social 
order, harmony, and economy of effort. We, therefore, 
seek that all American children shall speak a common 
tongue, write a mutually understandable prose, have a com- 
mon knowledge of certain standard literature, comprehend 
and appreciate alike the important facts of our geography, 
history, and civic life. 

But it is another function of education to see that our 
young people are fitted efficiently to discharge their respon- 
sibilities in the small groups of which they will inevitably 
be a part. Membership in, and sympathy with, the large 
groups of civilized society are essential to the harmony of 
the social order; but active and properly coordinated par- 
ticipation in the activities of smaller groups is essential to 



346 Vocational Education 

efficient personal growth, individual efficiency, and ultimate 
usefulness. 

Hence the desirability of partial group differentiation of 
pupils even as early as twelve years of age. Their needs 
include fitting for those special group activities in which 
they can most profitably serve themselves and society. As 
to some of these children it is certain that their opportunities 
for school education will close forever at or near fourteen 
years of age. We may not always know the particular 
individuals of whom this is true — although a shrewd social 
diagnostician, knowing the facts as to the home conditions, 
school standing in studies, intellectual interests, general 
moral behavior, and physical conditions of one hundred 
children at twelve years of age, could, I think, guess right 
as to ninety per cent of them. But even if we do not 
know the future as regards particular individuals, we do 
know it in large measure of collected groups, in the statis- 
tical sense — we know of probable numerical ratios and 
percentages; hence any refusal on our part to provide 
opportunities into which individuals will fit as well as may 
be on the initiative of themselves or their parents, with 
perhaps our advice, is wasteful, inefficient, and essentially 
undemocratic. 

There is a certain small percentage of our pupils who, by 
virtue of their probable future opportunities for usefulness 
and self -gratification, ought to have early opportunity to 
study a foreign language — German, French, Portuguese, 
Russian, or Japanese. Here again, at the age of twelve we 
may not be able to select just the persons who should be 
advised to do this; but if the opportunities are provided, 
and if parents are fully advised as to the conditions, re- 
quirements, and probable fruits of this work, and if admis- 
sion to it is restricted to those who have shown superior 
ability in the vernacular, choices will be right perhaps fifty 
or seventy per cent of the time. 



The Administration of Vocational Education 347 

It is assumed here, of course, that no vocational training 
as such will be given in the junior high school. That will 
come later and will naturally require a large degree of 
specialization — in a city the establishment of even hun- 
dreds of different and unlike specific vocational schools to 
prepare for the hundreds of separate commercial, industrial 
and domestic occupations into which modern life is divided. 

But in the junior high school large opportunities should 
be given for practical arts training, which, while not voca- 
tional in its outcome, may help towards vocation-finding, 
and will certainly give insight into the ideals and social 
significance of occupational life, if properly directed. 

To be of real service, however, practical arts education 
(industrial arts, agricultural arts, household arts, nautical 
arts, and commercial arts are all included under this head) 
must be diversified according to the fundamental interests 
of children; and the spirit in which each type of work is to 
be approached should be that of the amateur. Courses 
should be flexible. A pupil entering printing for the first 
time, for example, should have the option of several simple 
introductory projects; after he has given reasonable atten- 
tion to any one he should, if he wishes, be permitted to 
take up projects in a totally unrelated field — e.g. gardening. 

Hence the need of the flexible course of study which only 
the junior high school type of organization can provide. 

Let us repeat: The proposed junior high school type of 
school organization is an administrative means — a neces- 
sary means — to certain essential forms of improvement of 
the education of young people from twelve to fifteen years 
of age. 

Principles of Aim. — The following are submitted in con- 
clusion as essential principles governing the organization of 
curricula of the junior high school : 

1. Junior high schools are to be considered as of two 
types : 



348 Vocational Education 

Type A, replacing present seventh and eighth grades (the 
6-2-4 plan), to offer normally two years of instruction 
(with occasional provision for a " graduate " year parallel- 
ing, but not replacing, the first year of the regular high 
school). Modal ages of pupils expected, seventh grade 13 
years, eighth grade 14 years. 

Type B, replacing present seventh and eighth grades and 
first year of high school, to offer, usually, three years' work 
(the 6-3-3 plan). Modal expected ages by grades, 13, 
14, and 15. 

For purposes of convenience it is assumed that full-time 
attendance of all children to the 14th birthday is enforced, 
after which attendance (except for much retarded pupils, 
and except, in some states, continuation school attendance) 
becomes voluntary. 

2. There is no suggestion in American school legislation, 
and almost none in educational theory generally accepted in 
this country, that any kind of training that might properly 
be called vocational should be required or even offered 
within that period of the child's life, during which general 
school attendance is obligatory. This is certainly sound 
policy. Hence the A type of junior high school, at least, 
must be expected to devote itself almost, if not quite, exclu- 
sively to giving what, as opposed to vocational training, 
should be called general or liberal education — that is, gen- 
eral education towards good citizenship, towards personal 
culture, and towards physical fitness, as the numerous spe- 
cific powers and qualities under these heads are approved 
among our people, irrespective of the particular vocations 
they follow. But amateur participation in the simple phases 
of occupations which the pupils do not expect to follow — 
printing, gardening, typewriting, bicycle repairing, house 
painting, as well as observation of, and much reading about, 
the occupations which men and women actually follow, are 
to be regarded as valuable elements in liberal education. 



The Administration of Vocational Education 349 

These socializing phases of hberal education which lead to 
widened and deepened vision, rich experience, enlarged 
sympathies, and genuine humanism should be greatly ex- 
tended in the junior high school. All of these approaches 
to new experience and enrichments of old experience will in 
a measure, too, serve the purposes of vocational guidance. 
Hence all general vocational guidance (and, under some cir- 
cumstances, even the specific individual diagnosis and recom- 
mendation that should immediately precede placement in 
vocational school or vocational employment) is to be re- 
garded a legitimate part of the general or non-vocational 
education appropriate to the junior high school. 

3. Practical arts courses, involving maximum practicable 
amateur participation for general education, will surely be 
offered to a greater or less extent in prosperous and pro- 
gressive junior high schools, than in grades and high schools 
in the past. If the public approves the idea of the '' longer 
school day " we may expect to see as much as two hours 
daily available for practical arts participation. But, ob- 
viously, there are so many varieties of practical arts courses, 
long or short, to be drawn upon, that great flexibility of 
offerings and large freedom of election by the pupil will be 
desirable wherever administrative necessities and economics 
do not render it impracticable. 

4. What can or should be the vocational contribution of 
the type B junior high school? Obviously, the majority of 
the pupils in the third grade or year of this school will still 
be interested in obtaining a general education, in most cases 
to be continued in senior high school or college. But some 
will have the desire, or be under the necessity, of entering 
early upon productive work. What can be done in or by 
the B type of junior high school in its third (or even a 
fourth graduate year) to prepare these for their vocations? 

An adequate answer to this requires analyses, on the one 
hand, of possible vocations, and, on the other, of suitable 



350 Vocational Education 

procedures preparatory thereto, which analyses educators 
of academic prepossessions have been loath to make. What 
are the actual vocations for which, in specified communities, 
youngsters of from fourteen to sixteen years of age can be 
trained (or otherwise prepared) in whole or in part? Can 
the " junior high school," conceived chiefly as a faculty 
and curricula, effectively include such preparation in its 
work? 

Only definite surveys in each case, taking account of 
local conditions, can give final answers to these questions. 
But there are a few principles that seem now possible of 
definition. 

Probably, outside of agriculture, there are very few 
" trades," systematic training for which can profitably be 
begun as early as fourteen or even fifteen. For homemak- 
ing, motives are probably not ripe — and certainly voca- 
tional training is wasted on those who have no keen, vital 
motive for it. The manual or craft trades — dressmaking, 
machinist work, cooperage, blacksmithing, hand tailoring — 
are steadily disappearing, except in the case of the few in 
building trades and personal service — house carpentry, 
plumbing repair, barbering, waiting on table, shoe repairing, 
and horseshoeing. But in commercial and industrial fields, 
subdivision of labor and specialization of process have done 
much to make available to young people at almost any age 
specialized callings which, for juvenile workers — and for 
them only — pay well. Proper provision of opportunities 
for vocational training for juvenile workers at the close of 
the periods normally devoted to juvenile employment — for 
doffer boys, e.g. at seventeen or eighteen, for factory girls, 
perhaps just before marriage — has yet to be made by 
society. But it is certain that for the usual juvenile occu- 
pations, very brief courses of thoroughly practical training 
will suffice. One month of intensive training for the doffer 
boy, three months for the messenger boy, six months for the 



The Administfation of Vocational Education 351 

salesgirl, and eight months for the power operator would 
doubtless suffice. 

Can the junior high school effectively offer such training? 
Experience seems to answer in the negative. Probably it 
will require the evolution of the '' vestibule " school. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE TRAINING OF TEACHERS FOR VOCATIONAL 

SCHOOLS 

Dearth of Vocational Teachers. — During the last few 
years educational administrators, called upon to provide 
various types of vocational schools, have been compelled to 
make bricks without straw. Naturally teachers have been 
unavailable. Men technically equipped in various agri- 
cultural branches were to be had ; specialists in bookkeeping 
and stenography could be found in business; and skilled 
trade workers could be had from the crafts and factories 
at salaries a trifle above those paid to high school teachers. 
But these men were not teachers ; and only rarely were they 
equipped to cope with teaching in fields where traditions are 
few and each man is expected to hew out the paths of 
method for himself. 

From the manual training field came a few men who had 
become, through their own efforts, real teachers of carpen- 
try, machine shop metal working, printing and electrical in- 
stallation. Household arts or home economics teachers 
have striven valiantly to answer the call for teachers of 
vocational homemaking; but since the essential characteris- 
tics of training for this vocation (or these vocations) is still 
somewhat obscure, it is impossible as yet to predict results. 

Until the passage of the Smith-Hughes Act, very little 
effective provision had been made by the states for the 
training of vocational school teachers. A few commercial, 
and many agricultural and home economics, school graduates 
had been prepared to teach technical subjects in their re- 

352 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 353 

spective fields ; but there were few who could teach business 
practice in any of its aspects, or farming or homemaking. 
A few evening classes designed to prepare selected trade 
workers to teach their specialties had been established. But 
all of these sources have been understood to be provisional, 
and unsatisfactory at best. 

The pressure of war training for the shipbuilding and 
other industries forced the development of some valuable 
'' short course " training of men, already skilled as indus- 
trial workers, to become teachers of practice in industrial 
specialties. The lessons of this training still await appli- 
cation. 

During the next decade it is certain that a large amount 
of study will be given to the training of vocational school 
teachers. The conditions and problems analyzed below will 
certainly require a large amount of investigation. 

Types of Vocational School Teaching. — The simplest types 
of teaching in vocational education are, of course, to be 
found when the elder worker or the more skilled worker 
shows the younger or less skilled. At bottom, doubtless, 
there exist in all persons genuine instincts of teaching — 
otherwise to be described as instincts of showing, leading, 
helping, suggesting, instigating, directing, controlling, gov- 
erning, organizing, commanding, etc. Likewise, under the 
right social stimulus, there probably always appear in nor- 
mal individuals the " learning " instincts — instincts of fol- 
lowing, imitating, yielding, inquiring, submitting to author- 
ity, desire to be shown, etc. The operation of these social 
instincts can be seen on any playground, in any school, shop, 
or other theater of social activity. 

On the other hand, the most complicated types of voca- 
tional teaching are to be found in large schools of vocational 
training where teaching functions are highly subdivided, — 
where, for example, one teacher, who, perhaps, has never 
practiced the vocation itself, imparts certain technical knowl- 
2 A 



354 Vocational Education 

edge, another directs certain experimental work, and still a 
third supervises initial efforts at practice. Subdivision of 
vocational teaching of this character can now be seen in 
normal schools, agricultural colleges, medical colleges, 
schools of navigation, and the like. In not a few commer- 
cial departments of high schools, one teacher takes charge 
of stenography, another typewriting, a third of commercial 
law, a fourth of English. A few of the larger trade schools 
exhibit similar tendencies. 

An intermediate stage is found where one teacher or type 
of teacher is responsible for " practice " and another for so- 
called ''theory" or the "related technical subjects." In a 
few cases of half-developed or self-styled vocational schools, 
a teacher of " manual exercises " has been found, who is 
not himself a master of the trade being taught, but who un- 
dertakes to teach on the basis of exercises, some of the 
special activities supposed to be involved in the trade. The 
cabinet-making, printing, woodturning and lathe work of 
some manual training high schools, the needlework of 
household arts schools, the " business practice " of the com- 
mercial schools, and the school gardening of agricultural 
schools are examples. 

There are good grounds for believing that an ideal voca- 
tional education, at least for the non-professional occupa- 
tions, can best be given by one person who is at once master 
of its practical phases, and at the same time intimately ac- 
quainted with its technical aspects, and who, with these 
powers combines a large vision as to the possibilities of the 
right exercise of the calling to affect for the better society 
and the personality of the worker. A worker with this 
equipment who is also a gifted teacher would probably 
advance beginners, at least in vocational competency, faster 
than could any other type of teacher. Some successful ex- 
periments in agricultural education have been executed on 
this basis (based upon the "home projects," the pupils giv- 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 355 

ing something over half their time to these home projects, 
supervised by the teacher). 

But there are few indications that this method of voca- 
tional education will prove successful except in those two 
classes of callings which are in many respects yet in an ele- 
mental or primitive stage of evolution, — namely, farming 
and homemaking. The same method should be capable of 
application in many monotechnic industrial occupations 
(specialized machine processes or subdivisions of trades), 
but teachers equal to the responsibilities of such work are 
as yet hardly available. 

It is highly probable that in most forms of vocational 
education, teaching processes will become increasingly spe- 
cialized, and that even others than teachers will be required 
for special phases — business agents to take charge of the 
administration of work, " co5rdinators " to arrange for and 
supervise, on behalf of the school, pupils assigned to part- 
time productive work in shops, etc. Probable develop- 
ments in this direction can best be considered by taking the 
different classes of vocations successively. 

Teachers in Professional Schools Professional schools 

now usually procure their teachers in one of two ways: (a) 
successful practitioners in the profession itself are detached 
to become teachers, either on a part or whole time basis ; or 
{h) promising graduates, even with no practical experience, 
are given assistantships and are then slowly elevated to 
higher rank, the requirement often being imposed that some 
special study or research, and perhaps travel abroad, shall 
parallel the earlier years of service. 

Normal schools now usually procure their teachers under 
method (a). Formerly, when medical and legal education 
in college consisted chiefly of lectures, these lectures were 
usually given by well known practitioners. On the other 
hand, agricultural and engineering colleges, and those 
schools of law and medicine which are integrally related to 



356 Vocational Education 

university organizations and which tend to become more 
complete as respects the offerings of their various depart- 
ments, usually recruit their teaching forces under method 
(b). In these cases, however, there is always a considerable 
amount of pressure to draw into the teaching staff success- 
ful practitioners from the field. There are some indica- 
tions that this practice will increase in the future, although 
the lack of teaching ability shown by practitioners consti- 
tutes a common obstacle. 

Normal schools, while still making little provision for the 
training of their own teachers through having novices be- 
gin in assistantships, are increasingly disposed to insist on 
a period of graduate or advanced professional study as a 
preliminary to the acceptance of a normal school teaching 
position on the part of candidates otherwise of acceptable 
maturity and concrete experience. 

Agricultural School Teachers There are, as yet, in the 

United States few agricultural schools (as distinct from 
agricultural colleges) which offer what is even remotely 
and partially a vocatipnal education for the various voca- 
tions comprehended under the collective terms of gardener, 
farmer, and stock raiser; hence the problems of training 
teachers for these schools have not really come to the front 
as yet. Until the essential pedagogy and administrative 
principles which shall characterize effective vocational agri- 
cultural education have been formulated and generally ac- 
cepted, we shall have to content ourselves largely with spec- 
ulation. 

Nevertheless, some things are now clear. If boys of 
from fifteen to eighteen years of age are to be trained to be 
successful gardeners, farmers, and stock raisers (or, more 
pretentiously, horticulturists, agriculturists, breeders, dairy- 
men, etc.), a large amount of definitely organized practical 
experience must be made an essential part, and probably a 
major part, of this training. Experience tends to show that 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 357 

this generalization holds, even in the case of those boys who 
have lived, and, in out-of-school season, worked, on farms. 

Clearly then, the teachers of practical agriculture to these 
boys must themselves be capable of doing successfully those 
forms of farming which they undertake to teach. Clearly 
also, they must have a good background of technical (or 
"related science") knowledge of agriculture. In other 
words, the man who is to direct the practice of any phase of 
agriculture by vocational school pupils must possess the 
equivalents of three sets of quaHfications : (a) he must be 
an experienced farmer or at least demonstrably capable of 
being a successful farmer; (6) he must have a technical or 
scientific knowledge of agriculture (at least in his special 
field), ordinarily the equivalent of that required for a de- 
gree in agricultural college; and (c) he must have dem- 
onstrated some genuine teaching ability. 

It is undoubtedly the obligation and opportunity of the 
agricultural colleges of the United States, in view of their 
large responsibility to state and nation, seriously to under- 
take the task of training teachers for agricultural schools 
who will meet these requirements. Probably, however, two 
antagonistic conditions will have to be overcome before 
they will do this effectively. In the first place, as indicated 
above, the actual requirements of successful vocational edu- 
cation for the agricultural vocations must be defined, formu- 
lated, and made a matter of demonstration. In the second 
place, the authorities in charge of agricultural colleges and 
the other related agencies of scientific agriculture must be- 
come convinced that there is a place, and a large place, for 
vocational education in agriculture below the level of the 
college. In the main, they are not now genuinely convinced 
of this and so remain indifferent, if not in some cases secretly 
hostile, to proposals for the effective training of teachers 
for such schools. 

The problem will probably be simplified when American 



3S8 Vocational Education 

secondary education in its administration shall have taken 
that large step — almost leap — which is necessary to place 
secondary school teaching on a professional basis; namely, 
of refusing to accept a bachelor's degree, even when it has 
been obtained partly on the basis of so-called educational 
courses, as indicating the equivalent of professional prepar- 
ation for teaching. The country ought to be quite ready 
to stand for a legally imposed requirement that at least one 
year of definite professional preparation additional to the 
requirements of the bachelor's degree shall be met on the 
part of all secondary school teachers, as is now required in 
one state, and provided by a few colleges. 

Once this requirement is established, the agricultural col- 
leges will find in this graduate professional year at least an 
opportunity, if not an incentive, to give professional prep- 
aration to prospective agricultural school teachers, especially 
those who are to undertake the teaching of practical agri- 
culture. These agricultural colleges, though offering osten- 
sibly vocational education, are still tied to the chariot wheels 
of the B.S. degree which can in no true sense be a profes- 
sional degree, and which must always seriously deflect the 
aims of professional education. 

Doubtless education for the agricultural vocations will be 
so specialized in large schools as to permit of a moderate 
proportion of places for technically equipped specialists 
who may nevertheless have only a bowing acquaintance with 
the practice of agriculture. But in general, it is to be ex- 
pected that eventually all persons teaching agriculture 
towards vocational ends will have had some experience in 
the practice of that calling. 

It is probable that the study of general agriculture, or 
special phases, such as home-gardening, practical nature 
study, etc., will have a growing place in schemes of general 
or liberal education, especially for children from ten to 
sixteen years of age. Work of this character will not be 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 359 

regarded as vocational, and will not require teachers hav- 
ing practical knowledge of agriculture. 

Commercial School Teachers Few agencies now exist 

which have as their object the training of commercial school 
teachers. Commercial schools and departments have only 
rarely defined their objectives at all in terms of vocational 
efficiency, hence they have not created a demand for teachers 
demonstrably able to meet the practical requirements of a 
commercial vocation. They make use of several kinds of 
specialists — one who " knows " a system of stenography, 
one who can teach typewriting, and others who can teach 
the academic subjects such as commercial geography, Eng- 
lish, law, and mathematics (these rarely deserve to be called 
the " related technical " subjects, in view of the " academic " 
methods employed in teaching them). 

Usually the teachers of the technical subjects, — type- 
writing, stenography, bookkeeping, business methods, etc. 
— are taken from approved graduates of public or private 
commercial schools. In not a few instances, persons with 
training for, and, possibly, experience in, regular school 
positions take some commercial work and thus qualify as 
teachers of commercial subjects. 

Many universities are now establishing business or com- 
mercial departments, but there is no evidence that these will 
seriously undertake the training of teachers for commercial 
schools. 

Some years ago, the Massachusetts State Normal School 
at Salem established a special department for the training of 
commercial teachers. At first the course was two years in 
length; in 1912, it was lengthened to three years; and in 
1914, a fourth year was added, to be given exclusively to 
field work as described below. 

In general, the Salem department does not train specialist 
teachers within the field of commercial teaching, — that is, 
teachers of stenography as distinct from teachers of book- 



360 Vocational Education 

keeping, and other specialties. Theoretically, each gradu- 
ate is expected to be able to teach any and all commercial 
subjects that might be required in the business department 
of a small high school. Necessarily, the equipment of these 
graduates cannot be very complete at any point, especially 
as they must have taken small portions of numerous studies, 
technical and pedagogical. Necessarily too, they are quite 
lacking in the vocational viewpoint or the capacity to trace 
the results of the subjects they teach in their practical func- 
tioning. To them, " bookkeeping " is chiefly a set of 
" principles," not an extremely variable form of practical 
achievement in the world of business affairs. Hence the 
subject as taught actually functions in practice only as the 
study of trigonometry as taught in school or college func- 
tions in civil engineering. Typewriting and stenography 
are learned more as specific arts, but even here it is difficult 
to approximate the requirements of the business world. 

Many of the graduates of the Salem school have attained 
success as teachers in high schools having commercial de- 
partments, notwithstanding the comparatively general and 
necessarily incomplete character of the training they have 
received. This success has in part been due to the fact that 
the high school departments in which they have been em- 
ployed have been, in reality, only quasi- vocational. In many 
cases the principals of these schools have been more con- 
cerned to make their so-called commercial departments serv- 
iceable means of general education (sometimes for an in- 
ferior class of students), than to insure their functioning 
as agencies of definite vocational training for commercial 
occupations presenting known requirements. 

In 1914, the Board of Education added a fourth year to 
the Salem training course; but without increasing the 
actual amount of school work required. It was planned 
that each student, after two years' attendance in the training 
school, should obtain wage-earning employment in offices 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 361 

or stores for the third year, and return to complete the course 
in the fourth year. It was desired that the year of wage- 
earning employment should, as far as practicable, be divided 
in equal parts among the following four commercial occupa- 
tions : salesmanship; bookkeeping; general office work (cler- 
ical) ; and stenography and typewriting. In practice, of 
course, this ideal scheme, owing to the exigencies of obtain- 
ing employment, could not always be carried fully into exe- 
cution. 

Nevertheless, even under most unfavorable conditions, 
there is every reason to expect that the year of practical 
work required will give the prospective commercial teacher 
a valuable body of experience with some of the concrete real- 
ities of the commercial occupations, as a result of which she 
will surely teach with greater vocational purposiveness. 

There are, as yet, almost no institutions undertaking to 
place the training of teachers for the vocational commercial 
education of its various possible kinds on a higher basis in 
the United States. No very strong demands seem as yet to 
exist for such an institution; possibly such demands will 
not be made until the true character of vocational education 
shall have been more adequately defined than at present. In 
large part, commercial education in America seems to be in 
a state of arrested development, halting at a kind of midway 
technical stage between "general " and "' integral " or basic 
vocational education. 

Industrial School Teachers The training of teachers for 

industrial schools presents many novel problems. In the 
first place, there are in existence no institutions seriously 
undertaking such training at present. In the second place, 
the industrial occupations have become indefinitely subdi- 
vided until, in any large community, they literally number 
many hundreds. In the third place, many of the recently 
developed industrial trades or specialties or speciahzed jobs, 
as they may be called, seem on the surface to demand no 



362 Vocational Education 

special training in their workers. Nevertheless, it is now 
clearly apparent that for the sake of the workers themselves 
as well as for the sake of the industries and the economic 
prosperity of the country dependent upon them, industrial 
education of many types must soon be developed under 
public auspices. It is highly probable that within a short 
time the Smith-Hughes Act with its national grants will act 
as a gigantic stimulus to the promotion of industrial educa- 
tion in all industrial states. 

For the purposes of discussion here, every industrial spe- 
cialty for which wages is paid will be called a trade, no mat- 
ter how far its subdivision may have been carried. Further- 
more, the three fundamental aspects of vocational training; 
namely, (a) that having to do with the attainment of prac- 
tical skill, (b) that having to do with acquiring related tech- 
nical knowledge, and (c) that having to do with acquir- 
ing general knowledge related to the vocation, will be here 
respectively called (a) trade practice, (b) trade technology, 
and (c) trade sociology. 

In a complete program of industrial education for any one 
occupation, there would be included under (a) (trade prac- 
tice) all that training based on practice in productive work, 
such training to involve rigid tests of capacity to produce 
quantity of output as well as quality of output, as a final con- 
dition of approval. 

Under (b) (trade technology) will be included all that 
systematic instruction in related sciences, arts, mathematics, 
and special technique and " tricks of the trade," which go to 
make up technical proficiency. 

Under (c) (trade sociology) will be included all that in- 
struction in the history of the occupation, its economic and 
social significance in the world at the present time, the legal 
rights and obligations of its workers, principles of sanita- 
tion and hygiene as applied in the industry, and many other 
facts of a sociological nature. 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 363 

A fundamental assumption regarding industrial education 
for trade pursuits which may differentiate that education in 
greater or less degree from other forms of vocational educa- 
tion is to the effect that trade technology and trade sociol- 
ogy cannot advantageously be taught in advance of trade 
practice. In the professions, and, doubtfully, in agriculture, 
homemaking, and some commercial fields, it seems to be 
possible in a degree to teach occupational technology and 
occupational sociology to some advantage in advance of the 
teaching of the earlier stages of occupational practice. 
All experience is convincing on the point that this is not 
practicable or desirable in industrial education. 

Furthermore, it is probable that in the majority of cases, 
trade technology and trade sociology cannot advantageously 
be taught at a considerable interval subsequent to the ac- 
quisition of the results of trade practice. Hence, the gen- 
eral assumption that effective industrial education involves 
the adoption of means whereby trade practice, trade tech- 
nology, and trade sociology shall be taught in some manner 
that is substantially pari passu, or in intimate correlation. 
Probably, some means whereby the acquisition of a moderate 
amount of the vskill resulting from trade practice shall be 
followed by a substantially equal period devoted to building 
on this basis related trade technology and trade sociology 
will prove most effective. 

The first assumption to be made relative to the training of 
teachers for industrial schools is that no one can be a suc- 
cessful teacher of trade practice who is not himself capable 
of entering the trade itself as a fully equipped journeyman. 
Furthermore, it is assumed that no one can be a suc- 
cessful teacher of trade technology who has not had sub- 
stantial experience, although not necessarily the amount 
required of a journeyman, in the practice of the trade itself. 
Finally, it is assumed that the only safe teacher of the trade 
sociology appropriate to any particular industrial calling is 



364 Vocational Education 

one who in a variety of ways has had some actual experience 
in that calHng itself. The further assumption may safely 
be made that a teacher of trade practice will not ordinarily 
need to have the equivalent of a general high school educa- 
tion, although, of course, the possession of such a general 
education would be of undoubted advantage to him. The 
following may then be regarded as some of the distinctive 
problems involved in the training of industrial school teach- 
ers. ( 1 ) From what sources shall the student body be de- 
rived? (2) How shall trade practice training be pro- 
vided? (3) How shall training in trade technology and 
trade sociology be provided? (4) How shall training in 
methods of teaching and school administration be provided? 
(5) How shall students be supported during their train- 
ing ? (6) What teaching force must be provided ? 

1. At present, persons seeking to teach in industrial 
schools are taken chiefly from the trades themselves, and are 
given by one means or another a meager training in trade 
technology, trade sociology, and methods of training. An- 
other small source of supply has been the manual training 
school from which a few men of practical capacity have been 
recruited. These methods of securing industrial school 
teachers are precarious for a number of reasons, which do 
not require discussion here. 

Provided sufficient facilities for a complete training could 
be made available, undoubtedly the first sources of students 
for prospective teachers could be found by taking young 
men and women who possessed the equivalent of a good ele- 
mentary education, and perhaps of a two years' high school 
education, and subjecting them to such training that after a 
period of from four to six years, they would have acquired 
the equivalent of the practical skill of journeymen in their 
respective occupations and would also in the meantime have 
acquired considerable proficiency in methods of teaching and 
other necessary subjects. In time, it might be expected 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 365 

that trade or industrial schools would supply some excellent 
material for training schools of this character. 

2. Assuming the existence of a body of young students not 
yet having had experience in trades, but who are desirous of 
becoming trade teachers, how shall they be given practical 
experience substantially equivalent to that expected of the 
journeyman in the trade ? The maintenance by a training in- 
stitution of productive shops sufficient for this purpose would 
be difficult and expensive, and it would be especially hard to 
insure that these shops would reproduce faithfully the condi- 
tions of production in the commercial world. Undoubtedly, 
best results would be secured by a cooperative working ar- 
rangement with industries whereby the novices could be 
assured of sufficient opportunity on a part-time basis to cover 
all the stages of apprenticeship in the industry under actual 
commercial conditions. It might prove advisable for the 
training institution to give a few months of introductory shop 
practice as a means of insuring that the novice who was 
seeking a place in the industries could come to his first wage- 
earning, or at any rate, responsible work, with some slight 
preparation. This scheme of training for any particular 
trade would probably involve special arrangements for part- 
time participation. Under some circumstances, the novice 
might give one week to productive work and an alternate 
week period to the study of his theoretical subjects in the 
training institution. Perhaps for many industries an ar- 
rangement involving alternate periods of one month, three 
months, or a half-year might prove more advantageous. In 
every case, the training institution should provide that for 
any particular job in the commercial world, a pair of stu- 
dents should be available so that continuity of service to the 
employer could be assured. 

3 and 4. Training in trade technology and trade sociol- 
ogy, as well as in methods of teaching and other related 
pedagogical subjects, manifestly cannot be given in the in- 



366 Vocational Education 

dustry itself. These subjects should be provided for by the 
training institution, in every case under the guidance of spe- 
cialists in the trade itself. In the last stages of the training 
of the prospective teacher, some facilities for practice teach- 
ing, perhaps in the capacity of an assistant in existing voca- 
tional schools, should be made available. 

5. There are special reasons why prospective industrial 
teachers should have the question of their support during 
the period of training carefully considered. As a rule, 
these teachers will come from the families of artisans and 
others who can hardly be expected to provide for their sup- 
port during the prolonged period of training. After the 
first year of the course of training outlined above, it should 
prove easily possible for the learner to earn enough through 
his part-time participation in industry to meet his immediate 
necessary expenses. The lowest sum now usually paid to 
quite young part-time workers in trade work is 10 cts. an 
hour (all figures are based upon 1914 prices). For the 
more mature student under consideration here, this could 
undoubtedly be increased to 15 cts. or 20 cts. an hour in 
many trades, which, on the condition of half-time partici- 
pation in wage-earning work, would suffice to meet, in large 
part, expenses for living, that is, from $180 to $240 per 
year. 

6. Particular attention would be required in the matter 
of providing a suitable teaching force for a school of the 
character here contemplated. The training institution it- 
self would necessarily have to contain a few specialists in 
trade technology, trade sociology, and methods of teaching. 
Quite probably, in time, one person could be found who 
could equip himself to give the trade technology and the 
trade sociology of from three to half a dozen distinct trades, 
especially those in related fields, such as the building trades 
or the textile trades or the transportation trades. 

One of the most important officers of instruction would 



The Training of Teachers for Vocational Schools 367 

have to be the person who would supervise the progress of 
students in their, shop work. This man corresponds to the 
coordinator now found under Dr. Schneider's arrangement 
in Cincinnati University. It is understood, of course, that 
the student working in a commercial establishment is under 
the immediate direction of the foreman, as is every other 
workman, and that at any given time the foreman and the 
learner are both concerned primarily with production. In 
the shifting of the worker from one job to another, however, 
the recommendation of the coordinator must play a large part, 
and it is to the coordinator that the student must look for an 
interpretation and analysis of his experience as well as for 
many suggestions looking to its improvement. In many 
cases, doubtless, the coordinator could give the trade tech- 
nology and trade sociology required for a particular field of 
trade training. 

The following are certain concrete proposals based upon 
the foregoing: 

Let it be assumed that there have been established in 
various parts of the country, industrial schools for the 
training of plumbers. These schools are in search of teach- 
ers for whom the prevailing salary is from $1400 to $1800. 
An industrial normal college undertakes to train these work- 
ers. The following are the plans that might be followed : 

Plan A. The industrial normal college advertises eve- 
ning pedagogical courses for journeyman plumbers, these 
courses being designed to give so much pedagogy and also 
so much of the trade technology and the trade sociology of 
plumbing as may be necessary to provide proper equipment 
for teachers of plumbing. If the supply of properly 
qualified journeyman plumbers were sufficient for such a 
comparatively inexpensive means of training teachers, this 
plan might suffice to meet existing demands. 

Plan B. The industrial normal college might advertise 
courses wherein young men possessing the equivalent of a 



368 Vocational Education 

high school education could receive two or more years* train- 
ing in the technology of plumbing, the sociology of that 
trade, and some training in methods of teaching. The 
graduate from these technical courses would then be ex- 
pected to serve at least a two years' apprenticeship as a 
plumber, after which he would be approved as a teacher 
in an industrial school for plumbers. 

Plan C. The college might advertise courses of from 
four to six years in length wherein young men of from six- 
teen to twenty years of age, possessing the equivalent of a 
two years' high school education, might be trained on a 
part-time basis (part time in industry and part time in 
school) , to become teachers of plumbing. After the first half 
year, on the basis of present practice, it might be assumed 
that these young men as assistants in plumbing would be 
paid from 10 cts. to 20 cts. per hour, for the services, thus 
earning from $120 to $240 per year, on a half-time basis. 
The technical courses in the institution would be closely re- 
lated to the practice being followed in the field. During the 
last years of a four or six years course, a part-time expe- 
rience as assistant teacher in an industrial school could be 
substituted for participation in the industry itself. 



CHAPTER XII 

SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 

Vocational education in schools is of comparatively mod- 
ern development especially in other than professional fields. 
Hence, administrators still encounter a large number of un- 
solved problems. Furthermore, all education is still in pre- 
scientific stages of development; and in proportion as efforts 
are made to reach scientific stages, new problems are re- 
vealed in the fields of liberal or general education, which 
also affect vocational education. The object of this sec- 
tion is chiefly to attempt to analyze and to give definite 
statement to some of these problems. 

Every attempt looking to clearer analysis and definition of 
the problems of vocational education will hasten the day of 
experimental and other systematic attempts at their solu- 
tion. This process of analysis and definition should be 
steadfastly opposed to the thinking in terms of " omnibus " 
generalizations that is so commonly characteristic of ad- 
dresses and published articles dealing with the purposes and 
methods of vocational education. Definition, systematic or- 
ganization or experience, experiment, measurement of re- 
sults — these are some of the means by which education may 
be expected gradually to take its place among the depart- 
ments of applied science. 

In some instances these problems have been outlined in 
previous chapters, but they are restated briefly here for 
the sake of encouraging special study. 
2 B 369 



370 Vocational Education 

I. The Relation of General or Liberal, to 
Vocational Education 

Problem 1. To what extent do studies designed for lib- 
eral education '* function " ^ as to their content in various 
fields of vocational training ? 

For example, do Latin, ancient history, and algebra 
** function " at all in the training of the physician for his 
vocation? Do mechanical drawing and science '' function '' 
in the making of the bookkeeper? Do the studies of music 
and graphic art make any recognizable contribution toward 
the efficiency, on the vocational side, of the machinist, the 
farmer, or the cook? Are there cases where study of 
graphic art contributes to the productive powers of dress- 
makers — of high grade, average grade and low grade? 
Under what circumstances, if any, do mathematical studies 
contribute to the proficiency of farmers or carpenters? Or 
studies of chemistry and physics to homemaking? 

Problem 2. To what extent and in what way do studies 
in general or liberal education so " function " in mental train- 
ing as indirectly to make important contributions toward 
vocational efficiency? 

For example, does the study of mathematics contribute 
specifically to the development of the mental powers, in kind 
or degree, requisite in the lawyer, the dentist, the music 
teacher, or the homemaker ? Do the interests and types of 
appreciation developed in the study of literature '' function " 
at all as valuable mental qualities in the training of the en- 
gineer, the house carpenter, or the clerk? 

Problem 3. To what extent and under what conditions 
do various special types of vocational education so '' func- 
tion " as to result in the knowledge, appreciation, and ideals 
that are important in liberal education? 

1 The word " function " is used here in the sense that means and 
methods as adopted lead to results as intended. Studies, as well as 
methods of instruction, are means to ends ; they " function " when the 
ends are realized as intended. 



special Problems of Vocational Education 371 

^ For example, in the case of a student who has studied 
little or no science, what will the vocational study of agri- 
culture contribute as a by-product to his general insight into 
the applications of science ? In what way will the study of 
teaching as a profession supplement deficiences in liberal 
education? Will an effective program of vocational train- 
ing for the house painter contribute materially to his general 
intellectual and esthetic development ? 

Problem 4. To what extent and under what conditions 
will systematic vocational education contribute, as regards 
mental training, to the ends that are valuable in general 
education ? 

In what ways, for example, does the close application to 
practice and theory required in the training of a printer 
develop such so-called general intellectual powers as atten- 
tion, concentration, order? Or how do the concentration 
and close thinking required on the part of a boy studying 
farming practically and theoretically result in the develop- 
ment of corresponding general mental powers? To what 
extent do the strong interests frequently evoked by voca- 
tional studies call into activity mental powers left inactive 
in general education ? 

Problem 5. To what extent is it expedient and desirable 
that the beginnings of systematic vocational education shall 
be postponed until after a definite degree of general or liberal 
education has been attained? 

For example, if we assume that pupils are required to 
attend school tmtil 14 years of age, is it expedient or de- 
sirable that from 12 to 14 a program consisting in part of 
vocational, and in part of liberal, education shall be made 
available? Is it practicable or desirable, in the case of 
youths from 14 to 16 who are to enter industrial callings at 
16 years of age, to offer combined programs of liberal and 
vocational education prior to that age? 

Problem 6. In case it seems desirable to divide the pupil's 



372 Vocational Education 

time at any given stage between vocational and liberal edu- 
cation, how shall the division be made? 

For example, shall studies be alternated by hours, as in 
an ordinary commercial high school; that is, one period, 
perhaps, being given to algebra, another to stenographic 
practice ? Or shall the day be so divided that one half may 
be effectively given to concentration on vocational pursuits 
and the other half to general education ? Or is a division 
on the basis of longer periods desirable; for example, one 
week being given to liberal education, another to vocational ; 
or six months to liberal and six months to vocational educa- 
tion? Is a third program preferable, whereby the central 
part of each working day shall be given either to vocational 
or to liberal education, as the case may be, with the marginal 
part to the other type? For example, pupils might work 
from 8 to 3 o'clock on general studies (or vocational stud- 
ies), and from 3 to 6 on vocational studies (or liberal stud- 
ies). In practical life, it will be remembered, men usually 
pursue their vocations during the greater part of each work- 
ing day, reserving evenings, holidays, etc., for recreational 
and cultural purposes. 

II. Problems of So-called General Vocational 

Education 

It is contended that certain studies or practices serve as 
a basis for general vocational education ; that is, presumably, 
give fundamental elements needed in many callings. 

Problem 1. To what extent are any of the studies usually 
found in a program of general education (excepting reading 
and writing) vocationally fundamental to a number of call- 
ings? 

For example, it was formerly asserted that the study of 
Latin was vocationally fundamental to the subsequent study, 
for professional purposes, of law, medicine, theology, edu- 



special Problems of Vocational Education 373 

cation, and botany. It has long been thought that the study 
of mathematics is vocationally fundamental, not only to 
the engineering professions, but also to law, medicine, and 
almost all other advanced pursuits. It is a widespread be- 
lief that mechanical drawing is fundamental, in a vocational 
sense, to industrial, agricultural, and perhaps even commer- 
cial pursuits. Again, there survives a belief that a pro- 
gram of vocational education might be devised which would 
train the so-called handy or all-round practical worker. 

Problem 2. Does modern society present a general de- 
mand for the person who, while not exceptionally proficient 
in any calling, is ready and practical in many ; for example, 
the man "handy" with tools, the "all-round" clerk, etc.? 
Are there demands for ready men of this type in village or 
rural communities ? In large factories ? On shipboard ? 
In regimental camps? In large buildings? 

Problem 3. What courses of practical instruction will 
train the " handy " man, as he is in demand, for example, 
in farming communities? In which and how many of the 
following lines should he be reasonably adept — electric in- 
stallation, tractor repair, well boring, animal surgery, house 
painting, concrete laying, horseshoeing, chimney building, 
water pipe laying? 

III. Problems of the Transfer of Results of 
Vocational Education 

Problem 1. To what extent and under what conditions 
do the results in skill, knowledge, appreciation, and ideals 
(or of practical experience in general) in one occupational 
field constitute an asset for entrance into another? 

Problem 2. To what extent can the results in skill, 
knowledge, appreciation, and ideals (or of practical experi- 
ence in general) obtained in one occupational field be uti- 
lized as a basis for systematic training toward another occu- 
pational field? 



374 Vocational Education 

The following are examples of these problems: (1) To 
what extent does expertness in running constitute an asset 
in learning to swim ? (2) To what extent can a thorough- 
going education in the practice of medicine be utilized when 
the doctor wishes to become a farmer? (3) How far can 
professional competency as a bookkeeper be regarded as an 
asset when the bookkeeper wishes to become a machinist? 
(4) If a man has been well trained as a machinist, to what 
extent can such training be drawn upon in equipping him to 
be a house carpenter? (5) A farmer's son " picks up " a 
great variety of vocational experience; to what extent does 
this constitute an asset when he wishes to become a physi- 
cian, a locomotive engineer, a manager of an industrial en- 
terprise ? 

(a) It is obvious that these problems are capable of be- 
ing scientifically investigated as soon as psychology possesses 
the necessary tools. There exist now a large variety of pop- 
ular beliefs or prejudices on the subject. For example : 

( 1 ) Some vocational school authorities believe that boys 
aged 16 or more, who wish to learn a trade, succeed much 
better if from 14 to 16 they have had a miscellaneous indus- 
trial experience as job workers in various unskilled or ju- 
venile occupations. But effect of selection is obvious here, 
and is probably deceptive. Only boys of exceptional char- 
acter, probably, seek admission to industrial schools after 
such a period of miscellaneous experience. 

(2) There is a widespread belief that the varied and 
often intensive experience obtained in farm life constitutes a 
valuable basis for almost any kind of subsequent employment. 

(3) It is also believed in some quarters that persons who 
have for several years habituated themselves to a special line 
of manufacturing or commercial employment (for example, 
bookkeeping, shoemaking, draftsmanship, weaving) are 
permanently disqualified in large measure from taking up 
employmeret in other fields. 



special Problems of Vocational Education 375 

{h) Even superficial analysis will show that these prob- 
lems must be approached with reference to particular types 
of qualities involved. For example, few people would assert 
that skill obtained in playing baseball can be directly utilized 
in learning to swim. On the other hand, results of physical 
development, such as lung power, strength of arm muscles, 
etc., obtained in baseball may constitute valuable assets in 
learning to swim. Again, the life of the farmer's son may 
give little direct preparation in skill or knowledge for the 
work of a physician, but, on the other hand, a general atti- 
tude toward work, a disposition to finish jobs once under- 
taken, an appreciation of the value of money or recogni- 
tion resulting from successful work, may in large measure 
be transferred. 

(c) Much will depend, naturally, upon the relation- 
ship of the various occupations involved, according as these 
deal with similar working conditions, similar tools, identical 
materials, etc. One would expect a drill press operator to 
bring to the work of the planer a variety of important as- 
sets, while one would not expect the bookkeeper to bring to 
house carpentry at least similar assets. 

{d) It must be recognized that prolonged practice in any 
occupation may, in an important degree, disqualify the per- 
son for pursuit of another not related to it. The man who 
has followed farming for several years is in many respects 
disqualified to become a counter salesman of dry goods; 
the actor disqualified to become a farmer; the machinist to 
become a bookkeeper, etc. 

{e) The question is an important one for several reasons. 
In the first place, there are many occupations which cannot 
be entered upon in youth — for example, that of locomotive 
engineer. The locomotive engineer must have served in 
some other calling for several years, for which, presumably, 
he could have systematic training. Will his previous ex- 
perience as stationary engineer or as fireman constitute, in 



376 Vocational Education 

the long run, a sufficient preparation for his work as loco- 
motive engineer? Again, systematic vocational education 
in schools for some occupations is easily possible ; for others, 
extremely difficult. If a transfer can be easily effected, then 
we might train a person to be first a house carpenter or a 
farmer, even though we knew that eventually he would fol- 
low the sea as a sailor or work underground as a coal miner. 

IV. The Problems of Professional Education 

The problems of professional education are in the main 
remote from the purpose of this book. But one of general 
interest is that relating to the extent to which a program of 
professional training should base the so-called technical 
studies upon foundations of practical experience. 

Problem 1. To what extent does effective vocational edu- 
cation for any profession require that the present order of 
studies, which involves the giving of technical instruction in 
advance of practical experience, should be modified, or even 
reversed in order that a certain amount of practical experi- 
ence shall be taken perhaps at the outset and at intervals 
in the course of professional training? 

For example, in the training of teachers it would be prac- 
ticable, if desirable, to have a certain amount of practice 
teaching done at the very start as a basis for the subsequent 
study of methods, theory, etc. An engineering student 
might at the outset be given practical employment in some- 
thing of an apprentice capacity along practical lines. A 
prospective physician might serve as a hospital orderly, 
nurse, etc., before completing his training. 

Problem 2. To what extent shall training for professions 
which are not as yet clearly differentiated presuppose, as a 
basis, a complete professional training along the lines of pro- 
fessional training already established ? 

In agriculture, for example, professional fields of " ad- 



special Problems of Vocational Education 377 

ministration of agricultural plants," '' rural engineer," " ru- 
ral journalist," etc., seem to be in process of differentiation. 
In medicine, there is a demand for specialists in such fields 
as optometry, school physician, etc. In the commercial 
occupations, certain fields of expert inquiry, statistical work, 
and salesmanship seem to be assuming the proportions and 
standards of professions. In industry, we have as yet sys- 
tematic training for the positions of foreman, overseer, and 
the like, only in very few fields. 

(a) At present it is often assumed that before one may 
take up professional training in these undifferentiated or 
" nascent " professions, it is necessary that he should have 
a complete professional training along some established 
line. This process, however, is costly, and it is a question 
whether the resources of the community or of the individual 
trained are always equal to it. The question of necessity 
must also be considered. For example, the school nurse and 
school physician represent distinct demands to-day in special- 
ized fields for which it is doubtful if the historic training of 
the nurse and of the physician are at all necessary prerequi- 
sites. The professions of rural engineer and of rural jour- 
nalist may, on the other hand, be of such a nature as to re- 
quire not so much a large amount of technical training in 
agriculture, as maturity and a wide range of experience be- 
fore they are taken up. 

{h) In many instances, indeed, the problem involved is 
one of maturity and experience rather than the purely tech- 
nical training of the person embarking in such work. Most 
directive or managerial positions require as primary essen- 
tials, maturity and experience. It is quite probable that in 
some of these professional lines the ultimate solution will 
be that the person will take a definite amount of practical 
training for the historic occupation itself, and will then en- 
ter upon some field of practice with a view of returning, 
later, for advanced study toward managerial or other related 



378 Vocational Education 

work. It has been proposed, for example, that a school for 
the preparation of superintendents and principals of schools 
should presuppose perhaps five years of experience as 
teacher before systematic study for the administrative work 
is begun. 

V. Problems of Industrial Education 

Because of the highly differentiated character of the 
trades and industries a series of problems arise in industrial 
education which have not yet appeared in other fields. 

Problem 1. To what extent and under what conditions 
shall training be given for highly specialized occupations 
in manufacturing and other related callings where so-called 
" unskilled " or specialized service is in large demand? 

For example, in the manufacture of cotton and woolen 
cloth, the number of specialized occupations is now nearly 
one hundred. Some of these seem to require little or no 
special training, and may be adequately supplied by the labor 
of children or women. In shoemaking it is said that the 
number of specialized operations for each of which individ- 
ual workers are employed now reaches several hundred and 
is steadily increasing. Similar tendencies toward differen- 
tiation and specialization of occupation are found in food- 
packing, iron and steel working, small hardware and jewelry 
manufacturing, printing and publishing, the building trades, 
transportation, and even certain phases of agriculture, such 
as sugar production, wheat growing, etc. The building up 
of department stores, large jobbing houses, and the like in 
commerce increases, also in a large degree, specialization in 
salesmanship and clerical service. 

(a) There is no evidence that the tendency toward ex- 
treme differentiation and specialization in occupational fields 
will be stayed. In proportion as economic units of produc- 
tion and exchange enlarge, supervision becomes more effi- 



special Problems of Vocational Education 379 

cient, and mechanical devices are invented and improved, 
so, it would appear, in almost all occupational fields special- 
ization and the relatively large employment of unskilled serv- 
ice seem to increase. The persistency of this tendency 
will depend upon the economic advantages resulting from 
such specialization. 

{h) On the other hand, from the standpoint of the in- 
dividual worker, serious questions, as yet very slightly in- 
vestigated, arise as to the psychological, moral, and physical 
effects of extremely specialized occupation. A large part 
of personal growth in character, physical powers, and prob- 
ably also in mental capacity has always been dependent upon 
the occupation followed. Early specialization may con- 
ceivably result in partial or complete arrest of development 
in these lines. 

It is probable, however, that specialization of occupation 
for one whose physical growth has been completed is much 
less dangerous than for one still plastic. Hence, while ex- 
treme specialization for a worker at 15 years of age may 
give bad results, the same may be not at all true if the occu- 
pation is entered upon at the age of 22 or 23. This repre- 
sents a promising field for further inquiry and investiga- 
tion. 

(c) In the meantime there are good grounds for urging 
that all persons be given an opportunity for systematic voca- 
tional education, either in some trade requiring various oper- 
ations, or over a series of the special operations found in a 
highly specialized manufacturing or other economic pro- 
cess. 

Problem 2. To what extent and under what conditions 
can training for f oremanship be organized and conducted ? 

In almost all fields of organized industry the post of fore- 
man, overseer, or other special director of groups of workers 
is clearly recognized. Such posts commonly require (1) 
the degree of expert knowledge of the occupation which a 



380 Vocational Education 

skilled worker is supposed to possess; and also (2) qualities 
not easily described, but related to leadership, capacity to 
direct workers, knowledge of human nature, organizing abil- 
ity, etc. 

(a) Foremen must combine, of necessity, native ability 
with high degree of training; hence almost invariably these 
must be selected men who have had considerable experience. 

{h) Experience does not suggest that industrial schools 
can train foremen, as such, economically. Young people 
from 14 to 20 years of age can hardly be selected with refer- 
ence to their native ability to serve as foremen. Hence, 
training in the special lines of knowledge required for fore- 
manship would be largely wasted. On the other hand, when 
skilled workmen are selected after several years of experience 
for positions of foremanship they often find themselves 
handicapped for lack of the technical knowledge which fore- 
men should have. 

(c) Probably the need should be met by (1) a syste- 
matic course, offered to all alike, toward the occupational pur- 
suit itself, followed by (2) opportunities at evening schools 
and short courses for workers who have had a few years' 
experience in the industry, further to qualify themselves if 
they desire. 

Problem 3. To what extent shall prolonged courses of 
industrial training be offered to girls in industrial and other 
occupational fields, who, in the main, will spend but from 
four to seven years in the occupation, after which they will 
take up homemaking ? 

The Census of the United States shows that at the present 
time there are employed in this country a very considerable 
number of girls from 14 to 20 years of age. It is well 
known that the large majority, probably at least 90 per cent 
of these in the wage-earning callings, will take up homemak- 
ing as a career between the ages of 20 and 27. The prob- 
lem of the industrial training of these, therefore, involves, 



special Problems of Vocational Education 381 

on the one hand, comparatively short courses of training, 
and, on the other, courses which will produce the maximum 
degree of efficiency in early stages. 

Problem 4. Are there callings in industrial fields inter- 
mediate between those of a strictly professional nature, such 
as engineering, and those of a strictly trade nature, for 
which a large degree of technical instruction, as distin- 
guished from practical training, is desirable? 

It is sometimes alleged that there are such technical fields, 
for which, for example, the technical training offered in 
some of our high schools might be suited. Draftsmanship 
is sometimes alleged as an example, while in other fields 
such occupations as assaying, computing, and the like, may 
serve as examples. No sufficient analysis of these possi- 
bilities has yet been made. 

Problem 5. What, at any given stage of vocational train- 
ing for the industrial occupations, should be the proportion 
of time and energy of the pupil given, respectively, to tech- 
nical instruction and to practical training? 

Extreme and opposed examples of the problem under con- 
sideration are the following : ( 1 ) In the making of the 
machinist, a boy beginning at the age of 14 might devote his 
first two years very largely to such technical studies as draw- 
ing, mathematics, mechanics and shop exercises, together 
with shopwork and shop English, and on the other hand 
give a minimum amount of attention to productive shopwork 
of a thoroughly practical nature. Between his sixteenth and 
eighteenth years the proportion of time given to his shop- 
work might be very greatly increased, with a diminution of 
the amount of attention given to technical work. 

(2) On the other hand, a program of training could be 
devised by which during the first year he might give from 60 
to 80 per cent of his time to productive shopwork, with rela- 
tively only a small amount of technical instruction related to 
it. In his later years the proportion of time given to shop- 



382 Vocational Education 

work might be diminished, and the proportion of time given 
to technical instruction might be greatly increased. 

The problem involved is not one merely for a given in- 
dividual, but one which shall meet the requirements of the 
large proportion of individuals as these present themselves 
for training. The first program might be the better for the 
person, if he could be found, who possesses inherent quali- 
fications for foremanship; but it might prove exceedingly 
wasteful for that large majority of prospective workers in 
iron and steel who have little capacity for abstract thinking. 
The second program might prove much the better for the so- 
called " concrete-minded " people, and might also prove 
more effective for those who were capable of surviving four 
or more years of training as given. 

VI. Problems of Commercial Education 

The chief problems found in commercial education at the 
present time, apart from those involving its relationship to 
general education, are found in connection with the unan- 
alyzed character of the occupations, from the standpoint of 
programs of commercial training. 

Problem 1. To what extent should commercial occupa- 
tions other than those of (a) accountancy and bookkeeping, 
(b) stenography and typewriting, be differentiated for the 
purpose of vocational education? 

Statistics show clearly that in the commercial world ap- 
proximately 80 per cent of the workers are found in fields 
of salesmanship, etc., as against 20 per cent in the specialized 
fields of accountancy, and stenography and typewriting. 
For the former occupations, however, little or no systematic 
vocational education is yet offered, in the main because re- 
quirements of these occupations that might be met by school 
vocational training have not been defined. 



special Problems of Vocational Education 383 

VII. Problems of Homemaking Education 

The two chief problems connected with homemaking edu- 
cation at the present time are (a) those connected with the 
more effective coordination of that education with the home 
activities of the pupils and {h) those connected with the 
age at which it is efficiently practicable to begin systematic 
vocational homemaking education. 

Problem 1. To what extent and under what conditions 
in a program of systematic vocational homemaking educa- 
tion can cooperation with the home be secured, and the equip- 
ment and facilities of the home be utilized for purposes of 
practical training? 

(a) Every girl seeking a homemaking education must 
either live at home, in school dormitory, or under other 
conditions involving close contact with the various opera- 
tions for which she is being trained. An efficient program 
of vocational homemaking education will involve the exten- 
sive use of the facilities thus offered. 

(&) The problem presents different aspects, according 
as the vocational day school or the vocational evening school 
is under consideration. The principle is the same in both 
cases, however. 

Problem 2. At what age is efficient homemaking educa- 
tion most practicable? 

It is quite probable that there must be differentiation of 
groups for homemaking education, according to age as af- 
fected by the occupations followed. For example, it may 
be doubted whether girls who from 14 to 21 years of age 
will be wage-earners in occupations not related to the home, 
and who will be either living at home as boarders or in 
boarding houses, can efficiently respond to vocational home- 
making education until somewhat late in their wage-earning 
careers. Again, when conditions of caste shall have been 
so changed that home employment on a wage basis shall be 



384 Vocational Education 

attractive, systematic vocational education for this might 
well be begun at 14 or 15 years of age. In the case of girls 
not contemplating wage-earning careers, but who design 
to remain at home, systematic vocational education might 
well take place during the high school period. 

VIII. Problems of Agricultural Education 

Some examples now exist of successful programs of agri- 
cultural vocational education wherein the home farm is 
successfully combined with the school for instruction and 
for the direction of practical work. The two problems at 
present most pressing are (1) the provision of opportunities 
for practical training for city boys, and (2) the problem 
of combining secondary vocational agricultural education 
With preparation for higher institutions for the study of 
agriculture. 

Problem 1. Under what conditions can boys living under 
urban conditions be provided with facilities for that portion 
of vocational agricultural education connected with practical 
work? 

Experiments are being made in the direction of renting 
vacant land adjacent to cities for this purpose and putting 
boys in charge of their work on a project basis. 

Problem 2. To what extent is it practicable for boys in 
the course of receiving a vocational agricultural education 
properly to qualify themselves for an agricultural college? 

Obviously the requirements of an efficient vocational agri- 
cultural education are defined by the conditions of success- 
ful farming. It is not yet clear as to what should consti- 
tute the minimum requirements for admission to the agri- 
cultural college. Probably the college should distinguish in 
its work between degree work and courses of agriculture of 
a practical nature. 



special Problems of Vocational Education 385 

IX. Problems of the Administration of 
Vocational Education 

The effectiveness of any form of vocational education de- 
pends largely upon the degree to which those directing it 
comprehend and respond to the practical requirements of the 
occupations for which training is being given. There arise, 
therefore, (a) problems as to obtaining teachers who have 
had experience in the occupation for which training is being 
given; {h) problems of keeping these teachers in intimate 
contact with the practical requirements of these occupations; 
(c) problems of maintaining or providing in connection with 
the executive authority in charge of the schools, specialists 
in vocational education; and {d) problems of providing, 
either in the legislative authority in charge of the schools or 
in an advisory relationship, representatives of the fields for 
which training is being given. 

Problem 1. To what extent and under what conditions 
can teachers in vocational departments be equipped with 
practical experience obtained through actual participation 
in the callings for which they are giving education ? 

(a) Experience seems to prove that effective vocational 
education can only be given by persons who have had suffi- 
cient experience in a practical capacity, in a particular oc- 
cupation, to enable them to succeed on a commercial basis. 

For example, where normal schools undertake to train 
teachers for successful teaching (and not merely to teach 
prospective teachers certain subjects of study) experience 
seems to show that such teachers must themselves have been 
successful in the field of practical work. In medical col- 
leges it is rare to find successful teachers who have not been 
commercially successful in practice. The best engineering 
teachers are those who have served some years at commer- 
cial work. In such trades as plumbing, pattern making, and 
others it is now agreed that a successful teacher must him- 
2 c 



386 Vocational Edttcation 

self have reached a stage where he could readily procure 
profitable employment. The situation is not clear as regards 
commercial and agricultural teachers, but doubtless the same 
principles apply in these fields, as well as in homemaking. 

(b) Granting the necessity of a considerable amount of 
practical experience on the part of teachers, the following 
are methods by which it could be obtained in conjunction, 
with suitable training in the art of teaching: Vocational 
schools might take as teachers only persons who have al- 
ready demonstrated their capacity in the world of practical 
effort, giving them in greater or less degree, just prior to 
their entrance on teaching, such training in the art of teach- 
ing as is practicable. 

This method has been followed in the past by medical col- 
leges, theological schools, and to some extent, engineering 
colleges and law schools. It is now followed by trade 
schools, and to a small extent, by schools of agriculture. 

(c) A person seeking to become a teacher in a vocational 
field might take pedagogical courses, followed by a certain 
amount of practical experience as a prerequisite before tak- 
ing up teaching. This is the prevailing method in normal 
schools and in some engineering schools. 

(d) A course of training might be devised whereby the 
prospective teacher would first take a course in a school 
looking toward teaching, followed by one or more years of 
practical participation in commercial work, this to be suc- 
ceeded by a definite period of study of the art of teaching, 
preliminary to taking a teaching position. This method is 
being proposed as a basis for the training of teachers of 
commercial subjects, etc. 

Problem 2. To what extent and by what means shall 
teachers in vocational schools be required to keep in close 
contact with the occupational fields for which they are giv- 
ing training? 

Jt is probable that in fields like industry and agriculture 



special Problems of Vocational Education 3B7 

and others where changes are taking place efficiency can be 
produced only by strongly requiring that teachers shall not 
only observe but actually participate, on a commercial basis, 
from time to time in the work in fields in which they are 
giving training. The most available means to this end 
would be periods of leave given from the school, during 
which teachers should participate in such work. This prac- 
tice is now found in some engineering fields. 

Problem 3. To what extent and by what means shall 
specialized direction be provided in the executive adminis- 
tration of vocational education? 

(a) The problem is one affecting (1) the headship of a 
department; (2) the directorship of a vocational school; 
(3) the general supervision of vocational education in an 
administrative unit, such as town or city; and (4) the ad- 
ministrative supervision of vocational education on behalf 
of the state, or other large unit of administration. 

(b) It is assumed that the headship of a department must 
be in the hands of one who is a specialist himself in the oc- 
cupation for which training is being given. 

(c) The directorship of a large vocational school having 
several departments will probably not be in the hands of a 
specialist in any one department, but rather in the hands of 
one who is a pedagogical expert in many lines and a good 
administrator. Eventually, such a position will probably 
be filled by promotion from headships of departments, such 
selection being made on the basis of natural ability for an 
administrative position. 

(d) There are good grounds for believing that in each 
city, or other administrative unit having many vocational 
schools, there should be an assistant superintendent special- 
izing in the field of vocational education, including there- 
under industrial, commercial, homemaking, and agricultural 
work offered, but not including professional. Whether he 
should also have supervision of the practical arts work as 



388 Vocational Education 

a phase of general education or when offered prevocation- 
ally is doubtful. 

{e) Similarly, where the administration of vocational 
education is supervised on behalf of the state there should 
be organized a separate department, dealing exclusively with 
vocational education. 

Problem 4. To what extent and under what conditions 
shall representatives of the various vocational fields partici- 
pate in the lay administration of vocational schools? 

(a) It should be assumed that every single vocational 
department in a system should feel the influence of repre- 
sentatives of laymen in the occupational field concerned (in- 
cluding both employers and employees, where these distinc- 
tions are clearly defined). 

(&) Obviously, it is impracticable to include laymen in 
this capacity in the school committee or board itself without 
making the latter unduly large. It may be assumed that a 
layman from one occupational field has not more capacity to 
assist in the administration of vocational education in an- 
other than any other layman. 

(c) Experience seems to demonstrate that the more effec- 
tive course is to place all vocational schools under the admin- 
istration of the regularly constituted school authorities, be- 
cause these are supported by public money, and to provide 
for each distinctive department a small advisory committee 
for the activity of which the department head shall be pri- 
marily responsible. 



CHAPTER XIII 

SOME FUTURE PROBLEMS 
I 

" Creative Impulse in Industry." — Miss Helen Marot, in 
her book under the above title (New York, 1918), has sug- 
gested one or more large problems of modern economic life 
which possess not only general importance but have also 
an intimate bearing upon all questions of future vocational 
education. 

Miss Marot's book is in part a criticism of the present 
industrial order and in part a prospectus of a plan for 
developing certain special agencies whereby opportunity can 
be given for experience in giving exercise to the *' creative 
impulse " in production. 

So far as we can give concrete expression to our most 
fundamental conceptions of '' highest human values," to 
the ''life more abundantly " which seems always to have 
been the " purpose " of social and personal evolution, we 
find these " values " making, on the one hand, for the " hap- 
piness "of the individual and, on the other, for the " in- 
crease " of society. Among the factors making, in greater 
or less degree, according to the individual, for the develop- 
ment of individual personality, is the exercise of what we 
vaguely call the creative instincts. Demands for growth 
and self-expression are imperious in childhood; and their 
analogous qualities seem also imperious in some adults. 
On the other hand, the command to labor which was, accord- 
ing to one account, laid long ago upon Adam and his de- 
scendants, seems to have involved since then severe circum- 

389 



39^ Vocational Education 

scribing of man's activities and probably suppression of a 
large proportion of the creative impulses of every indi- 
vidual. 

Modern social economy cannot be less interested in the 
opportunities that make for enriched personality than in 
those that make for such social means to that end as 
security, wealth, righteousness, sociability, knowledge, and 
the like. Every effort looking to fuller and better general 
or " liberal " education looks to that end. Every advance 
in invention, the application of science and organization in 
production, and all use of natural powers as substitutes for 
human power in doing the work of the world, whereby man's 
rising standards of living can be met while at the same time 
reducing the hours required for production, are contributing 
to the same end through increase of leisure and the means 
of utilizing the same. 

It is highly probable that we are as yet but at the begin- 
nings of our educational efforts to give scope and enrich- 
ment to human personality. If the means suggested by 
Miss Marot can add to the process, they will be welcomed. 
But whether the objectives towards which she aspires can 
be realized along the lines she hopes — that is indeed a 
problem. 

For it is apparent throughout Miss Marot's book that she 
has little confidence in the '' present social order," at least 
in so far as it is organized by " business." Miss Marot re- 
flects a social philosophy which, while very ancient in its 
essentials, has become more potent in recent years in 
proportion as economic systems have become more complex. 
It is a philosophy in which strong feelings, idealistic aspira- 
tions, formulae, and facts are extensively blended. In this 
philosophy one finds reference made almost never to such 
elemental facts as limitations in the earth's producing pow- 
ers, effects of increase of population, rising standards of 
wants, and the social need of conservation — of material 



Some Future Problems 391 

resources, human strength, working tools, order, and knowl- 
edge. It is a philosophy which premises the harmfulness, 
if not the malevolence, of certain types of institutions which 
have been of slow growth. On this philosophy she builds 
her refusals to approve certain current educational pro- 
posals and her advocacy of others. The following extracts 
are believed to be representative of this philosophy : 

" Sometime the war will end and we shall be called then to face a 
period of reconstruction. The reconstruction will center around indus- 
try. The efficiency with which a worker serves industry will be the test 
of his patriotic fervor, as his service in the army is made the test during 
this time of war. All institutions will be examined and called upon to 
reorganize in such ways as will contribute to the enterprise of raising 
industrial processes to the standard of greatest efficiency," 

" American business men before the war appreciated the educational 
system which made people over into workers without will or purpose of 
their own. But the situation was embarrassing as these business men 
were not in a position to insist that the schools, supported by the people, 
should prepare the children to serve industry for the sake of the state, 
while industry was pursued solely for private interest." 

" Business is concerned wholly with utility, and not like workman- 
ship, with standards of production, except as those standards contain 
an increment of value in profits to the owners of wealth. It was during 
the Guild period that business came to value workmanship because it 
contained that increment." 

" The logical development of factory organization has been the com- 
plete coordination of all factors which are auxiliary to mechanical power 
and devices. The most important auxiliary factor is human labor. A 
worker is a perfected factory attachment as he surrenders himself to 
the time and the rhythm of the machine and its functioning ; as he sup- 
plements without loss whatever faculties the machine lacks, whatever 
imperfection hampers the machine in the satisfaction of its needs. If 
it lacks eyes, he sees for it ; he walks for it, if it is without legs ; and 
he pulls, drags, lifts, if it needs arms. All of these things are done by 
the factory worker at the pace set by the machine and under its direc- 
tion and command. A worker's indulgence in his personal desires or 
impulses hinders the machine and lowers his attachment value." 

" The economic organization of modern society though built on the 
common people's productive energy has discounted their ' creative 
potentiality.' We hold to the theory that men are equal in their oppor- 
tunity to capture and own wealth ; that their ability in that respect is 
proof of their ability to create it ; a proof of their inherent capacity. It 
is a proof, as a matter of fact, of their ability to compete in the general 
scheme of capture ; their ability to exploit wealth successfully." 



392 Vocational Education 

" Modern industrial institutions are developed by an exclusive cul- 
tivation of people's needs and the desire to possess is responsible for 
the production of a mass of goods unprecedented and inconceivable a 
century and a half ago. The actual production of all of these goods is 
unrelated to the motive of men's participation in their production; the 
actual production in relation to the motive is an incident." 

" It is almost axiomatic to say that a system of wealth production 
which cultivated creative effort would yield more in general terms of 
life as well as in terms of goods, than a system like our own which 
exploits creative power. It is obvious that the disintegrating tendency 
in our system is due to the fact that production is dependent for its 
motive force on the desire to possess." 

" Before scientific management was discovered, business manage- 
ment and machinery already had robbed industry of productive incen- 
tives, of the real incentive to production : a realization on the part of 
the worker of its social value and his appreciation of its creative 
content." 

" Nevertheless the intention of all and the spirit of the scheme is to 
do as near nothing as possible in exchange for the highest return. The 
whole industrial arrangement is carried on without the force of pro- 
ductive intention; it is carried forward against a disinclination to 
produce." 

"It is incredible to factory managers that workers object to being 
taught 'right' ways of doing things. Their objection is not to being 
taught, but to being told that some one way is right without having had 
the chance to know why. This resistance to being taught, it seems, is 
nothing more or less than a wayward desire of a worker to do his own 
way because it is his way, and of course from the managers' point of 
view, that is stupid." 

" A responsible part in which production does not mean merely doing 
well a detached and technical job; it means facing the risks and sharing 
in the experimental experience of productive enterprise as it serves the 
promotion of creative life and the needs of an expanding civilization." 

" The creative significance of a product in use, as well as an appre- 
ciation of the act of creating, would be evident if modern production of 
wealth, under the influence of business enterprise and machine tech- 
nology, had not fairly well extinguished the appreciation and the joy of 
creative experience in countries where people have fallen under its 
influence so completely as in our own." 

" It is the present duty of American educators to realize these two 
points : that industry is the great field for adventure and growth ; that 
as it is used now the opportunities for growth are inhibited in the only 
field where productive experience can be a common one. Shortly it 
will be the mission of educators to show that by opening up the field for 
creative purpose, fervor for industrial enterprise and good workmanship 
may be realized; that only as the content of industry in its administra- 



Some Future Problems 393 

tion as well as in the technique of its processes is opened up for experi- 
ment and first-hand experience, will a universal impulse for work be 
awakened." 

" It is for educators to realize first of all that there can be no social 
progress while there is antagonism between growth in wealth (which is 
industry) and growth in individuals (which is education) ; that the 
fundamental antagonisms which are apparent in the current arrange- 
ment are not between industry and education but between educational 
business," 

" The craftsmanship period is valued in retrospect for its educative 
influence. There was opportunity then as there is not now for the 
worker to gain the valuable experience of initiating an idea and carrying 
the production of an article to its completion for use and sale in the 
market ; there was the opportunity then also as there is not now, for the 
worker to gain a high degree of technique and a valuation of his 
workmanship." 

" Educators have opposed the desire of business to attach the schools 
to the industrial enterprise. They have rightly opposed it because 
industry under the influence of business prostitutes effort." 

" The ideas which we find there have not sprung from schools or 
colleges but from industry. The institution of industry, rather than the 
institution of education, dominates thought in industrial education 
courses. It is the institution of industry as it has affected the life of 
every man, woman and child, which has inhibited educational thought 
in conjunction with schemes for industrial schools. No established 
system of education or none proposed is more circumscribed by 
institutionalized thought than the vocational and industrial school 
movement." 

Speaking in terms of social evolution the development of 
what we call '* industrialism " — which is primarily a series 
of phenomena growing out of the harnessing of natural 
powers such as wind, steam, electricity and gas — is but of 
yesterday. It is inevitable therefore that it should still be 
attended by many pathological conditions which society has 
moved too slowly to correct. No one could wish to dis- 
parage sincere and intelligent efforts to provide remedies or 
initial correctives to those now existing. 

On the other hand, radically destructive proposals com- 
monly confound the subject and the disease. It is poor 
economy to tear down a leaking house when neither time 
nor means are at hand to build another. Because Miss 



394 Vocational Education 

Marot's strictures are echoed by many other educators op- 
posing vocational education for what is sometimes mistak- 
enly called " efficiency," they deserve examination no less 
than the attendant proposals. 

The two most fundamental social facts in the modern 
industrial system are the multiplication of population and 
at the same time rising standards of living or increased 
desire for consumable goods. To meet these conditions 
men tend towards maximum use of capital and the tools it 
will purchase, regimentation and specialization of service 
from that of the highest executive to the lowest paid opera- 
tive, and delegation of function to the one best qualified 
by nature and training to perform it. These are the lines 
of least resistance, the apparent optimum resultants, the 
*' fit " that seem destined to survive. 

Miss Marot is right in thinking that one of the unde- 
sirable by-products of this is, at least for some individuals, 
the stifling of the creative impulse. But what about the 
facts, especially on the historical side? Does Miss Marot 
think we have gone backward in this matter since 1776, or 
1496, or 476, or 350 b.c. ? We must, of course, be careful 
of our logic in making inferences here. Booker Washing- 
ton used to protest against the unconscious habit exhibited 
by most people in comparing blacks and whites : they usually 
compare the best white man with the worst negro. He 
suggested that we try the exercise of comparing for a time 
good negroes with bad white men. Are we to think that 
the average (or statistically modal) stone-cutter, or weaver, 
or shoemaker, or wheat grower, or gold miner (omit the 
prospector), or brick-wall builder, or bottle maker, or sailor, 
or food packer, has less opportunity for exercise of creative 
impulses than had the average man in these fields hundreds 
or thousands of years ago? Or does she think the average 
small Alabama cotton grower, Labrador fisherman, New 
England farmer, Chinese gardener, Illinois farm housewife, 



Some Future Problems 395 

rural school teacher, village maid-of-all-work, office general 
clerk, country grocer, Mexican goat farmer, have greatly 
better opportunities for exercise of creative impulse than 
average locomotive engineers, coal miners, specialty teach- 
ers in large schools, New Bedford weavers, Waltham watch- 
makers (eighteen-year-old girls), department store clerks, 
Grand Rapids furniture makers, or Detroit automobile mak- 
ers? I think the naive assumptions now widely prevalent 
about these matters do considerable violence to individual 
psychology and to sociology. How do the men and women 
in these various fields compare in looks, health, zest for 
life, and cultural outlook at age 30? 45? 60? The occupa- 
tions given in the first group above are but slightly as yet 
affected by '' economic organization of modern society " — 
hardly at all as respects outlets for creative impulse. 

Everything practicable should be done to enhance oppor- 
tunities, whether on the primitive farm or in the home with 
its necessary composite of elemental operations; or in the 
shoe factory or department store, for exercise of creative 
impulses. But it is no use following Utopian visions in 
this matter or disregarding the fairly fixed facts of life in 
the individual and in the group. When a process, like, say, 
the planing or surfacing of wood, or the mixing of concrete, 
or the washing of dinner plates, has become standardized 
and the machinery for its performance well developed, the 
process may have to be repeated millions of times as routine. 
When experience shows that it is more effective for a train 
dispatcher to plan movements of trains and an engineer to 
receive and follow directions, one result is a shutting out 
of experiences which were combined in one man in days 
of '' teaming." But why rebel ? We certainly cannot 
go back? Any one of us, obliged to fight, would greatly 
prefer to be a soldier in a small guerrilla band of equals 
than a trench fighter on the recent French front. But the 
guerrilla soldier is practically valueless in modern defense. 



396 Vocational Education 

Miss Marot quotes on page 81 : '' The big electrical engines 
which are being introduced in the railroad system are 
rapidly eliminating the factors of judgment on the part of 
the engineer and transforming that highly skilled trade into 
an automatic exercise." 

That is true. But railroading did the same for stage- 
driving; and stage-driving did the same for "packing" on 
muleback ; and muleback packing did the same for the man- 
carrying which still survives in China and the mountains of 
South America. But will the electric locomotive engineer 
be less of a man than the stage-driver or the Chinese long- 
distance porter ? Look at them in Grand Central Station. 

Now it is extremely doubtful whether the " average 
man "of any considerable group in America is to-day less 
well off in any of the obscure essentials of happiness than 
the corresponding man among his ancestors in the eight- 
eenth, thirteenth, or fifth centuries, or among corresponding 
men to-day in China, India, Australia, or Argentina. It is, 
of course, statistically demonstrable that as respects certain 
concrete '' values " he is decidedly better off. But, the 
idealists contend, he should be better off in all respects, 
and he would be if he had his deserts — if some more or 
less mystic agents of evil did not perpetually despoil him. 
To this the sociologist must reply with much doubt, ''pos- 
sibly; but how can you establish it?" Individual instances 
prove nothing; and passionate aspirations no less than pas- 
sionate antipathies are poor guide-posts to knowledge. 

None of us reject either the characterizations or the hopes 
expressed in William Vaughn Moody's " The Brute " ; but 
we have the right and obligation to study and select the 
means which will realize the desired ends. It seems highly 
probable that the harnessing of science and natural powers 
in economic production means increasing regimentation, 
speciahzation of inventive function, and narrow routine per- 
formance. But we can afford to pay a considerable price 



Some Future Problems 397 

in these if they bring us doubled leisure, facilities for growth, 
security and abundance of the enduring goods of life. Is 
labor an end in itself? It has never been esteemed such in 
sound social philosophy. It is a means to '' life more abun- 
dantly," as are the economic goods which are its outcome. 

II 

Democracy and Education In his book on the philoso- 
phy of education — Democracy and Education (New York, 
1917) — Dr. John Dewey devotes one chapter to the "Vo- 
cational Aspects of Education," besides making reference 
to vocational aims in other chapters. Dr. Dewey has also 
dealt with problems of vocational education in various 
articles in journals. 

The present writer finds himself in agreement with much 
that Dr. Dewey urges, both by way of criticism of historic 
forms of school education, and of positive proposals for the 
improvement of that education. The reconstruction of 
school curricula, at least for children under twelve years of 
age, along lines suggested by Dr. Dewey, will without doubt 
prove of very great value to the individual as well as to 
society. 

But in what Dr. Dewey writes about contemporary 
social situations (in their economic aspects) as these con- 
stitute backgrounds for proposals for vocational education, 
as well as in what he suggests by way of criticism of current 
proposals for vocational education, the writer finds it very 
difificult to discover the foundations of practicable programs 
either for social policies in general or for educational policies 
in particular. This difficulty is increased by the fact that 
Dr. Dewey rarely discusses the problems of vocational edu- 
cation in concrete terms of the age groups, vocational 
specializations, and limitations of native abilities which are 
the unescapable realities of all contemporary social life as 



398 Vocational Education 

that presents itself to social economist and educator every- 
where. 

No well-informed educator will take exception to many 
of the criticisms of historic forms of education set forth in 
the chapter referred to above. Undoubtedly much of past 
and even of current discussion of vocational education, as 
well as of liberal education, has involved deeply entangled 
philosophical dualisms. But, from the standpoint of the 
recent writings of the proponents of widespread development 
of publicly supported vocational education, as well as from 
that of dictionary makers who seek to crystallize popularly 
accepted meanings of terms, is it helpful to say, as a contri- 
bution to a definition of vocation, " A vocation means noth- 
ing but such a direction of life activities as renders them 
perceptibly significant to a person, because of the conse- 
quences they accomplish, and also useful to his associates " ? 
Nor does it seem helpful to make " vocation " synonymous 
with *' occupation " or "career." Again, when Dr. Dewey 
says, '' The dominant vocation of all human beings at all 
times is living — intellectual and moral growth," he is using 
the term in an unrestricted way that entails confusion of 
thought for many. 

For several years it has seemed to many of us much more 
serviceable, as well as in accordance with popular under- 
standing as interpreted by the makers of dictionaries, to 
restrict the term " vocation " to that more or less continuous 
(in the sense of being taken up day after day) occupation 
by which adults primarily produce the exchangeable services 
or commodities essential to their support. Temporarily, a 
man may have other occupations than his vocation, just as, 
permanently, he may have one or more avocations besides 
his vocation. A man's occupation outside of hours devoted 
to his vocational life may be that of recreation, or extending 
his personal culture, or helping his wife in her vocation — 
that of homemaking — or in drilling for military service, 



Some Future Problems 399 

or in forwarding the ends of his poHtical party. The word 
" career," on the other hand, seems more inclusive than 
vocation. It includes not only the idea of vocation suc- 
cessfully pursued, but its consequences on social position, 
prestige, opportunities for leisure, etc. 

Because, historically, the welfare of man as well as that 
of his family has depended so greatly upon the success 
wherewith he pursues his vocation, it has been natural for 
that vocation to hold a central or primary place among the 
activities with which he concerns himself — and especially 
as he becomes purposive, self-controlled, and " civilized." 
Furthermore, it has been natural for society to think of man 
in terms of his calling more frequently than in terms of his 
other occupations, just as it frequently happens that a man's 
dress, manners, facial expression, and even mental and social 
characteristics are often greatly affected by his vocation. 
Nevertheless, as ''civilization" advances, society probably 
thinks less rather than more in terms of the man's vocation, 
partly because the range of his possible activities outside his 
calling, especially in urban communities, becomes more ex- 
tended. Of four persons at a club largely indistinguishable 
in dress and manner, one may be, as to business, a lawyer, 
another a bank cashier, another a college teacher of modern 
languages, and the fourth a real estate dealer. By their 
non-vocational activities they are variously designated as 
Catholics or Unitarians, Republicans or Socialists, golf- 
players or hunters, family men or bachelors, and the like. 

Of the artisans going home after an eight hour day's 
work, one may be a horseshoer, another a stairbuilder, an- 
other a riveter, and a fourth a pattern-maker. But they, 
too, have their varied non-vocational activities in which they 
may join cooperatively with each other, or occasionally 
cooperatively with the clubmen above. 

It seems to be a social fact of general application that the 
more primitive and undifferentiated a man's vocation, the 



400 Vocational Education 

more it seems to affect and control all his other activities. 
The primitive farmer, sailor, fisherman, hunter, domestic 
servant, priest, homemaker, teacher, and small trader seem 
to follow their respective vocations three hundred and sixty- 
five days in the year and twenty- four hours in the day. 
But is this a condition approved by men possessing the 
advantages of high vocational competency and good general 
intelligence? Is it not a fact that for these the ideal is 
" work while you work, play while you play " ? In all high- 
grade professional, commercial, and agricultural pursuits 
(and one sees signs of it too in military, navigational, and 
homemaking pursuits) there is an increasing tendency for 
each person to have a definite working day or schedule of 
working hours, after which, having produced a sufficient 
amount of those economic goods (commodities or service), 
whereby he becomes entitled to his needful share of the 
goods produced by others, he turns to his other activities — 
to his avocations, and his recreations, or to his religious, 
political, domestic, social, or cultural duties. 

It is in the light of these tendencies that the following 
passage from Dr. Dewey's chapter referred to above must 
be examined : 

" We must avoid not only limitation of conception of vocation to the 
occupations where immediately tangible commodities are produced, but 
also the notion that vocations are distributed in an exclusive way, one 
and only one to each person. Such restriction of specialism is impos- 
sible ; nothing could be more absurd than to try to educate individuals 
with an eye to only one line of activity. In the first place, each indi- 
vidual has of necessity a variety of callings, in each of which he should 
be intelligently effective ; and in the second place any one occupation 
loses its meaning and becomes a routine keeping busy at something in the 
degree in which it is isolated from other interests. No one is just an 
artist and nothing else, and insofar as one approximates that condition, 
he is so much the less developed human being ; he is a kind of monstros- 
ity. He must, at some period of his life, be a member of a family; he 
must have friends and companions ; he must either support himself or 
be supported by others, and thus he has a business career. He is a 
member of some organized political unit, and so on. We naturally 



Some Future Problems 401 

name his vocation from that one of the callings which distinguishes him, 
rather than from those which he has in common with all others. But 
we should not allow ourselves to be so subject to words as to ignore 
and virtually deny his other callings when it comes to a consideration 
of the vocational phases of education." 

Vocational Specialization Now, whether we Hke it or 

not, it is a fact that vocational speciaHzation is the rule in 
the modern economic order. It has proceeded far in those 
callings collectively designated as commercial and industrial. 
It is steadily proceeding in the professions and agriculture. 
It seems the inevitable accompaniment of the efforts of men, 
confronted by the pressures resulting from increasing den- 
sity of population and rising standards of living, and aided 
by the possession of invented tools, scientific knowledge, 
ambitious leadership, and reserve capital. The more able 
and enlightened men and women of our time in all lines 
are seeking opportunities to do their economically produc- 
tive work — the part constituting their vocations as here 
defined — in highly specialized fields. If we compare the 
specialized productive vocations of California, Massachu- 
setts, or Wales on the one hand, with those of Turkey, 
Bengal, or Shantung Province on the other, the distinctions 
between old and new, archaic and modern, retarded and 
progressive, will at once appear. 

Dr. Dewey seems to feel that this subdivision of labor is 
undemocratic besides being otherwise undesirable : 

" Any scheme for vocational education which takes its point of 
departure from the industrial regime that now exists, is likely to assume 
and to perpetuate its divisions and weaknesses, and thus to become an 
instrument in accomplishing the feudal dogma of social predestination. 
Those who are in a position to make their wishes good, will demand a 
liberal, a cultural occupation, and one which fits for directive power the 
youth in whom they are directly interested. To split the system, and 
to give to others, less fortunately situated, an education conceived 
mainly as specific trade preparation, is division of labor and leisure, 
culture and service, mind and body, directed and directive class, into a 
society nominally democratic. Such a vocational education inevitably 
discounts the scientific and historic human connections of the materials 

2D 



402 Vocational Education 

and processes dealt with. To include such things in narrow trade 
education would be to waste time ; concern for them would not be 
' practical.' They are reserved for those who have leisure at command 
— the leisure due to superior economic resources. Such things might 
even be dangerous to the interests of the controlling class, arousing 
discontent or ambitions ' beyond the station ' of those working under 
the direction of others. But an education which acknowledges the full 
intellectual and social meaning of a vocation would include instruction 
in the historic background of present conditions ; training in science to 
give intelligence and initiative in dealing with material and agencies of 
production ; and study of economics, civics, and politics, to bring the 
future worker into touch with the problems of the day and the various 
methods proposed for its improvement. Above all, it would train power 
of readaptation to changing conditions so that future workers would 
not become blindly subject to a fate imposed upon them. This ideal 
has to contend not only with the inertia of existing educational tradi- 
tions, but also with the opposition of those who are intrenched in com- 
mand of the industrial machinery, and who realize that such an 
educational system if made general would threaten their ability to use 
others for their own ends. 

" But this very fact is the presage of a more equitable and enlight- 
ened social order, for it gives evidence of the dependence of social 
reorganization upon educational reconstruction. It is accordingly an 
encouragement to those believing in a better order to undertake the 
promotion of a vocational education which does not subject youth to 
the demands and standards of the present system, but which utilizes 
its scientific and social factors to develop a courageous intelligence, and 
to make intelligence practical and executive." 

Now it is certainly true that in the present industrial 
regime there are all sorts of undemocratic possibilities. 
But are these inherent? If so, how do we explain the fact 
that with perhaps one exception, modern industrialism has 
advanced farthest in countries and regions most noted for 
political democracy — Scotland, Massachusetts, northern 
France, northern Italy, Michigan? One does not look for 
modern industrialism in Turkey, Russia, India, China, or 
Egypt, notwithstanding their natural resources and their 
pressure of population. 

Vocational vs. General Education. — It is one of the most 
pronounced contentions of the proponents of effective and 
democratic vocational education (for all, that is, — a few 



Some Future Problems 403 

leaders, as Dr. Dewey properly says, have long had these ' 
opportunities in the undemocratic order of the past) that ' 
one effect of modern specialization of occupation is to render , 
impracticable any considerable blending, on the one hand, 
of vocational and non-vocational education, and on the other * 
of vocational education for one vocation with that for 
another. In actual administration this should mean that 
each pupil should complete, to the fullest extent practicable, 
his non-vocational or liberal full-time education (largely 
designed to prepare him effectively for the non-vocational 
duties of life) before beginning his necessarily specialized . 
vocational education, and that thereafter his liberal educa- 
tion should be continued outside of " working hours." 

Vocational education, it must repeatedly be said, consists 
only of divisions or subjects of all possible instruction and 
training which primarily prepare one for the effective exer- 
cise of vocation over that span of years during which it is, 
or normally should be, followed. In practice, we think of 
the vocations of the barber, poultry grower, bookkeeper, 
tailor, sailor, high school teacher of physics, grocer, dentist, 
machinist, stenographer, house carpenter, cattle grower, 
priest, army officer, miner, and the like as filling up a long 
span of life, and for each of them specific vocational training 
and instruction — in a special school or elsewhere — is 
quite conceivable. It is true that for the successful pursuit 
of all or most of these vocations good health, good moral 
character, and literacy are also valuable or essential. But, 
in greater or less degree, the qualities and powers included 
under these terms are valuable or relatively essential alike 
for all the vocational, as for the no less important non- 
vocational, activities of life. Hence these become the proper 
aims of general or non-vocational education. It is only to 
the production of those specific skills and forms of knowl- 
edge wherein the dentist differs, as respects the production 
of economic goods, from the barber that the words voca- 
tional education, properly or in best recent usage, apply. 



404 Vocational Education 

Now this may mean educational dualism, but if so, it is a 
dualism based upon the present and probable future realities 
of life. But it is in reality a kind of pluralism of ends by 
which we are confronted. We do not teach singing by the 
same means, in the same places, or at the same times that 
we teach arithmetic. We expect the man or woman con- 
sciously and purposefully to differentiate play from work; 
and in all good domestic or school regimes we expect young 
people, at least those upward of twelve years of age, to do 
the same, in the degrees appropriate to their development. 
In our well-ordered life, we differentiate seasons for sleeping, 
for eating, for friendly social intercourse, for concentrated 
work; and no less, we differentiate the processes of training 
and instruction by which we habituate the young to these 
respective spheres or types of activity. 

It is certainly true that a man's various activities sum up 
into a kind of unity, as does a house, a farm, a tree, the 
human body, or any other composite of more or less inter- 
dependent parts. But, for practical purposes, we can con- 
sider not only separateness of part or function, but also the 
special means of producing or improving specific part or 
function. 

For many readers the fact that Dr. Dewey does not carry 
his discussion to the point of at least illustrating by con- 
crete reference to age groups proves a source of uncertainty 
and confusion. With such a statement, for example, as 
" the only adequate training for occupations is through 
occupations " all can agree. But when he says, " to pre- 
determine some future occupation (vocation?) for which 
education is to be a strict preparation is to injure the 
possibilities of present development and thereby reduce the 
adequacy of preparation for a future right employment," 
we find ourselves in agreement or disagreement according to 
the age and other conditions of the particular persons under 
consideration. Would Dr. Dewey apply this dictum in the 



Some Future Problems 405 

case of a young man of twenty who, one or two years before 
completing his general college course, makes up his mind, 
on his own initiative, or is even induced to do so, that he 
will specialize in preparation for the practice of medicine 
on graduating from college? If a young woman, pressed 
by family circumstances to become self-supporting at a rela- 
tively early age, is advised to enter normal school at eighteen 
years of age and take the training required to make her a 
good elementary school teacher, will this "predetermina- 
tion" injure her possibilities of future development? But 
it is still a social fact as it always has been, that the great 
majority of young people elect, or are obliged, to become 
productive workers (often in juvenile vocations, of course, 
from which they will seek other vocations more suited to 
adults when they acquire the requisite maturity, experience, 
and, in some cases, training) between the ages of fifteen 
and eighteen. It is highly desirable, certainly, that, as 
far as practicable, these early choices of vocations should not 
be final and irrevocable — and nowhere has freedom to shift 
from calling to calling been further developed than in 
America. Towards assisting and rendering more effective 
this mobility of labor — its present wastefulness is appall- 
ing — agencies of vocational guidance and of vocational 
training at the right stage should be developed to the utmost. 
If, however. Dr. Dewey has in mind the possible voca- 
tional predestination of young children or youths yet far 
removed from the necessities of entering upon productive 
work, then of course the best of sociological and educational 
opinion is entirely in accord with him. Under these con- 
ditions, we can heartily approve his recommendation that 
" the only alternative is that all earlier preparation for voca- 
tions be indirect rather than direct." But, in fact, where 
vocational specialization has proceeded far — as in the mod- 
ern industrial and commercial center — it may be doubted 
whether much of an " indirect " nature can be accomplished 



4o6 Vocational Education 

that will function later as specific vocational competency. 
Hence it may prove most effective to preserve as dominant 
aims in all earlier education, physical, moral, and cultural 
growth and training, as these are required for a common 
basis of good citizenship and good personality, irrespective 
of the particular vocation to be entered upon later. That as 
large a part as practicable of this " general " education 
should consist of means and methods designed to enable the 
youth to " find himself " as respects the vocations most 
suitable for him in later years goes without saying. No 
item of his " social education " is more important than this. 

Educative Values in Vocations. — One other problem dis- 
cussed by Dr. Dewey is certain to give difficulty to the social 
economist and educator. Dr. Dewey is right in analyses of 
present industrial and commercial specialization (pp. 366- 
68). Without doubt, "while the intellectual possibilities of 
industry have multiplied, industrial conditions tend to make 
industry, for great masses, less of an educative resource 
than it was in the days of hand-production for local mar- 
kets." Precisely : and it is for just this reason that many 
educators hold as necessary the conscious differentiation of 
education for citizenship from education for vocation. We 
may say, indeed, that modern production, as a condition of 
economic efficiency, tends to regiment its workers as work- 
ers; but it should not, and does not, if properly safeguarded, 
regiment them as citizens or cultured personalities. 

For the sake of a fairly illuminating comparison, let us 
press further the analogy between an industrial and a mili- 
tary army. In each specialization of function proceeds very 
far. Workers, according to their inherent and acquired 
powers, are variously differentiated for the performance of 
specialized forms of work. A few highly gifted and trained 
persons are placed (either by democratic election or by 
imposition from outside) in positions where planning on a 
large scale and far in advance of the event is required. 



Some Future Problems 407 

In many connections and at many levels, specialists are at 
work performing detailed functions and effecting specific 
coordinations. 

Now it is generally conceded that in each type of army, 
multiplication of functions has gone so far that it is utterly 
beyond the power of even the most gifted person to acquire 
even moderate appreciation, to say nothing of executive 
mastery, of the various specialized processes involved. The 
president of a railroad system is never expected, however 
able, to be a locomotive engineer, tunnel digger, train dis- 
patcher, freight agent, repair shop superintendent, or con- 
ductor. The general in the army is never expected to be 
an aviator, signaler, machine gun operator, truck driver, 
surgeon, or paymaster. But neither is it practicable, even 
if it were ideally desirable, for the locomotive engineer to 
understand, in any technical sense, the plans of the directors 
to extend their trackage, to petition for higher rates, to begin 
the systematic training of telegraphers or to adopt a new 
style of freight car. It is not practicable for the machine 
gunner to know the plans of those " higher up " with regard 
to feeding the army next winter, or improving on range 
finders, or taking steps to lessen communicable diseases. In 
all these cases, we are in the presence of limitations inherent 
in the very conditions of modern social organization. 

On the other hand, in political democracies the soldier and 
the industrial specialist, whether of high or of low rank, 
are also citizens and more or less cultured individuals {i.e. 
socially perceiving and feeling personalities). In these 
capacities, like all other citizens and cultured individuals, 
they should have the fullest practicable opportunities of 
comprehending, enjoying, and reacting upon the world of 
which they are a part. The soldier votes upon questions 
that affect the policies of the army of which he is a part; 
but no less he must also vote upon questions that affect the 
railway system of which vocationally he is no part. The 



4o8 Vocational Education 

locomotive engineer is expected as a well-informed man to 
know something of the significance of the railway system in 
which he is one instrument; but, no less, he is expected to 
know also something of the other railway systems, of his 
country's army system, and of all other social agencies which 
make up the vital elements, civic and cultural, in the world 
of which he is a part. 

It is apparent that Dr. Dewey, as all other persons sen- 
sitive to the pathological situations produced by the modern 
industrial order, greatly desires educational readjustments 
that will, as he hopes, tend to remove the limitations implicit 
in the systems described above. What many of us doubt 
is the practicability of achieving the desired ends along the 
lines indicated by Dr. Dewey. In so far as the suggestions 
contained in the following paragraphs can be carried out in 
schools of general education, he has our hearty support. 
But in so far as he makes these proposals as possible contri- 
butions to programs of vocational education, they seem pur- 
poseless and futile : 

" Both practically and philosophically, the key to the present educa- 
tional situation lies in a gradual reconstruction of school materials and 
methods so as to utilize various forms of occupation typifying social 
callings, and to bring out their intellectual and moral content. This 
reconstruction must relegate purely literary methods — including text- 
books — and dialectical methods to the position of necessary auxiliary 
tools in the intelligent development of consecutive and cumulative 
activities. 

" But our discussion has emphasized the fact that this educational 
reorganization cannot be accomplished by merely trying to give a tech- 
nical preparation for industries and professions as they now operate, 
much less by merely reproducing existing industrial conditions in the 
school. The problem is not that of making the schools an adjunct to 
manufacture and commerce, but of utilizing the factors of industry to 
make school life more active, more full of immediate meaning, more 
connected with out-of-school experience. The problem is not easy of 
solution. There is a standing danger that education will perpetuate the 
older transitions for a select few, and effect its adjustment to the newer 
economic conditions more or less on the basis of acquiescence in the 
untransformed, unrationalized, and unsocialized phases of our defective 
industrial regime. Put in concrete terms, there is danger that voca- 



Some Future Problems 409 

tional education will be interpreted in theory and practice as trade edu- 
cation : as a means of securing technical efficiency in specialized future 
pursuits. 

" Education would then become an instrument of perpetuating un- 
changed the existing industrial order of society, instead of operating 
as a means of its transformation. The desired transformation is not 
difficult to define in a formal way. It signifies a society in which every 
person shall be occupied in something which makes the lives of others 
better worth living, and which accordingly makes the ties which bind 
persons together more perceptible — which breaks down the barriers of 
distance between them. It denotes a state of affairs in which the 
interest of each in his work is uncoerced and intelligent : based upon 
its congeniality to his own aptitudes. It goes without saying that we 
are far from such a social state ; in a liberal and quantitative sense, we 
may never arrive at it. But in principle, the quality of social changes 
already accomplished lies in this direction. There are more ample 
resources for its achievement now than ever there have been before. 
No insuperable obstacles, given the intelligent will for its realization, 
stand in the way." 

Obviously the questions here raised by Dr. Dewey are 
sociological first and educational second. Society, in its 
prof ounder evolutions, uses education as a means ; and it is, 
of course, true that the education of to-day determines in 
part what the next generation shall think and feel. But 
educators are prone to lose sight of the fact that throughout 
all historic times education has been the means employed by 
the controlling forces in society; it is merely a pleasing 
fantasy that educators as a class have any extensive control 
of this means. The "social forces" growing out of 
man's instinctive nature, out of the economic limitations 
which surround him, and out of the social inheritance which 
he has created must largely determine what, in any age and 
clime, shall be the directions taken by those servants of the 
majority will, the educators. 

Hence, when Dr. Dewey speaks with confidence of the 
" unrationalized and unsocialized phases of our defective 
industrial regime " he may or may not be suggesting prac- 
ticable opportunities to the educators. It is clearly not the 
business of the educator with his inexperience to tear down 



4IO Vocational Education 

existing social structures of long standing and slow evolu- 
tion in the vague expectation that he, with the aid of some 
school children, can rebuild them along sound architectural 
lines. Nor would it seem worthy conduct in him to stand 
aside and refuse to share in amending present conditions 
because, forsooth, he thinks they should be reconstructed 
in their entirety. 

Of course education should operate as a means of trans- 
forming the industrial order — provided we have some rea- 
sonable assurance as to the practicable courses of such trans- 
formation. But we can only put into the schools to-day 
what the statesmen, writers, scientists, philosophers, enter- 
prisers, warriors, and inventors thought out clearly or did 
effectively yesterday. Until the scouts and the adult van- 
guard have reached some agreement as to the roads ahead, 
the plastic generation in the rear must hold to the tried 
paths — any other course means ruin. 

It is not to be understood that Dr. Dewey himself advo- 
cates, on the part of educators, as regards the present 
" industrial order " either revolution or even '' passive re- 
sistance." Only when his conclusions shall have been given 
concrete analysis and application to specific situations can 
we be certain just what their significance is. With his 
desire that general education in all grades shall, as a means 
of promoting good citizenship and democratic culture, 
employ to the fullest realistic contacts with the vital pulsat- 
ing environment — an ideal eloquently elaborated in the 
third chapter of H. G. Wells's New Machiavelli — all educa- 
tors are in profound sympathy. Rightly conceived and 
realized, that ideal does mean '' education for an industrial 
society " — liberal education, that is ; but it has little to do 
with vocational education. That is something different, 
sociologically and psychologically. We shall be able to 
learn what it is only as we take up the actual economic 
strands of contemporary social life and study them one by 
one, free from emotional prepossession and self-deception. 



CHAPTER XIV 

PROBABLE ECONOMIC FUTURE OF AMERICAN WOMEN ^ 

Any comprehensive program of vocational education must 
be designed primarily to prepare young persons for the effec- 
tive exercise of productive vocations as now found ; it may be 
designed secondarily and incidentally to anticipate probable 
social changes in the character and incidence of vocational 
activities; and, under some circumstances (taking due ac- 
count of the relatively fundamental and only slightly con- 
trollable character of economic forces), to further desirable, 
and to restrain undesirable, economic tendencies by its em- 
phasis on one or the other of different possible educational 
objectives. 

It is well known that the economic position of women has 
already changed greatly during the last century, and con- 
spicuously in communities in which productive work is 
chiefly of an industrial and commercial character. It is 
probable that many of the economic changes now in process 
will continue along lines already established, some of their 
social, cultural, and physical consequences becoming in- 
creasingly evident. But it is also certain that societies in 
which concerted and intelligent action, looking toward con- 
servation of the best in human resources and the promotion 
of higher social standards generally, has become an estab- 
lished policy, will insist on securing improved conditions for 
the development of the young, and with especial emphasis 
on sound family life. The mother of children is the logical 
primary custodian of children's well-being; and in their rear- 

iThis chapter in substantially its present form first appeared as 
a paper in the American Journal of Sociology. 

4.II 



412 Vocational Education 

ing will be found, inevitably, the best vocation for many 
women — best for the individual herself and best for the 
society which she serves. 

For training in the performance of all forms of economic 
service, including the rearing of children, women in the past 
to an extent even greater than in the case of men, have been 
dependent upon the by-education of productive service itself 
as carried on by elders. The daughter has learned the thou- 
sand practical arts of homemaking as an assistant to her 
mother, supplemented by the trial-and-error methods of her 
own home when responsibility for its conduct fell to her lot. 
The domestic servant has learned under the direction of 
mistress; the tiller of the soil under leadership of field fore- 
man or forewoman; the factory hand under shop overseer; 
the clerk under employer or supervisor. For only a few 
women's callings — teaching, nursing, stenography — have 
the methods of unorganized or organized apprenticeship 
been replaced by systematic vocational training. 

But no student of contemporary social conditions or of 
current proposals for improvement in our social economy 
can doubt that an enormous extension and improvement of 
systematic vocational education under public control and 
direction is inevitable in the near future. The provision of 
universal and perfected means of direct vocational education 
at the proper time (usually after the essential foundations of 
liberal education shall have been laid) clearly constitutes 
one of the most necessary stages toward the good citizen- 
ship, the social efficiency, now being sought in our compli- 
cated societies. It is hard for us to realize that almost in 
proportion as economic processes become scientific and 
highly organized, the possibilities of getting reasonably satis- 
factory vocational training as a by-product of early partici- 
pation in productive work itself — possibilities that were 
very large under primitive conditions of production — stead- 
ily diminish. Hence the need for vocational training as 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 413 

itself a specialized stage or process apart from, or closely 
guarded within, the productive processes themselves. Such 
segregated vocational training is certainly not less needed 
to-day for women, than for men, workers; and, in spite of 
the necessarily primitive and composite character of the 
domestic vocational arts, it is probably not less needed as 
a means of efficient homemaking than as a means of effective 
service in commercial, industrial, agricultural, and profes- 
sional callings. 

At present, very naturally, all programs for the vocational 
training of girls and women are largely provisional and even 
opportunistic. In fact, they are based primarily upon first- 
hand appreciations, not of social needs in general, but of 
certain marked socially pathological situations that have 
been seen vividly, first by social workers, then by educators. 
But to a constantly increasing extent, these programs must 
come to be based upon scientific knowledge of what are the 
established or probable fields of women's work; the probable 
transitions in economic service that will be made by women 
of given classes, ages, and abilities ; the physical, social, and 
cultural concomitants of each prevailing type of work; and 
the most effective reasons and means of giving and testing 
definite vocational training therefor. 

It is the purpose of this paper to analyze certain problems, 
as yet largely unsolved, relative to the probable economic 
future of American women during the twentieth century, 
on the assumption that present tendencies will continue in 
directions already established; and, in the light of the prob- 
abilities described, to suggest possible policies and programs 
for the vocational education of girls and women. As a pre- 
liminary to the analysis of these problems, it seems desirable 
to summarize briefly certain general conclusions as to which 
it is believed substantial agreement among well-informed 
students of economics and social life generally exists. These 
are : 



414 Vocational Education 

1. Women, normally, have always been producers of economic serv- 
ice no less than men. 

2. Productive work has always been largely differentiated between 
men and women as to location and character. 

3. The admission of woman to non-domestic occupations, though 
attended by great difficulties, is now substantially an accomplished fact. 

4. Woman's participation in non-domestic occupations promises to 
be increasingly regulated by law, in the interests of a sound social 
economy. 

5. The effective rearing of children in the capacity of wife and 
mother must always have priority of importance as woman's work. 

6. Few effective means of vocational education for non-domestic 
employments have yet developed for women. 

A. SOME ACCEPTED POSITIONS 

1. Women as producers. — In all normal societies, and 
in all but a few exceptional cases of individuals and small 
classes, women have always been producers of economic serv- 
ice equally at least with men. (The term "economic serv- 
ice " is here used to include the rearing of children, leader- 
ship in planning and directing work, defense of the state, 
socially approved commercialized entertainment, and teach- 
ing, no less than the production of material utilities.) It 
is a reasonable expectation that women will, in proportion 
to their strength and ability, always continue to be, no less 
than men, producers of valuable service. From time to 
time in past history, as well as at present, wealthy and power- 
ful men have been able and have preferred to maintain their 
wives, daughters, and female entertainers in that half-para- 
sitic condition which enhances their sesthetic and convivial 
attractiveness. This practice is clearly traceable to begin- 
nings in ages of conquest when the men of the conquering 
class reserved to themselves the vocations of fighting, law- 
giving, and general administration. It has rarely affected 
so large a proportion of the population in the past as to lead 
to disastrous eugenic consequences ; but the effects of segre- 
gating from useful service a substantial proportion of women 
and of making of them a non-productive " decorative " class 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 415 

may be proving disastrous in areas where great industries 
and commerce have enabled, not 1 or 2 per cent, but 10 or 
20 per cent of strong men to become so prosperous that they 
can carry into effect their very natural ideals of maintaining 
their wives in idle luxury, their daughters in parasitic use- 
lessness, and their entertainers in a state of '' conspicuous," 
but socially unproductive, consumption. But it is to be ex- 
pected that the increasing social insight of our time will soon 
forewarn and forearm us against this form of social disease. 
(See Ohve Schreiner's Woman and Labor.) 

2. Differentiation of productive work. — In all societies 
of which we have record there have existed tendencies, never 
wholly complete, toward differentiation of productive work 
along sex lines. Defense and aggression against animals 
and hostile humans has fallen largely to men, probably in 
part because of their greater mobility, and in part perhaps 
because of their greater share of the combative instincts (as 
in some animal species). The care of young children (in- 
cluding the giving of much early by-education) seems nat- 
urally to fall to women, partly because the physical condition 
of their functions requires them to be less mobile and un- 
doubtedly because maternal instincts making for child care 
are stronger than are the paternal instincts to the same end, 
especially as applied to very young children. 

On these foundations, as societies have evolved, many 
other differentiations have taken place. Men, being first 
warriors and hunters, have then become trappers, explorers, 
sailors, fishermen, drovers, traders, miners, and lumbermen. 
Women become cooks, weavers, dressers of skins, food 
packers, gardeners, milkers, brewers, builders, wood gather- 
ers, nurses, and teachers of little children. Old men and 
handicapped men shared early in the more home-centered 
occupations. When more roving occupations failed, men 
in the settled regions have often seemed to specialize in those 
forms of productive service requiring most sustained and 



4i6 Vocational Education 

greatest physical strength, especially if these occupations are 
carried on at some distance from the home. Occupations of 
building, heavy tillage, transporting, and merchandising thus 
fall to men, although in all primitive societies where women 
seem to develop bodily strength nearly, if not wholly, equal 
to that of men, and especially when war or slavery forces 
men away, women seem readily to become heavy tillers and 
bearers of burdens — occupations which probably they have 
never more than partially surrendered. 

The invention of machinery and the use of power have 
often had the effect of centering production in factories 
away from the home; and apparently men first fall heir to 
these new vocations, such as baking, machine weaving, 
machine shoemaking, iron and steel working, brickmaking, 
brewing, milking, food packing, etc. Certain occupations 
— originally domestic and apparently shared equally by men 
and women, especially healing and religious ministry — be- 
came early monopolized by men, while others, like enter- 
taining, teaching, lore transmitting, literature making, etc., 
have after a period of such monopoly returned to the state of 
being ''open" to men and women equally. 

In modern industrial and commercial societies, so much 
productive work is centered in factories, office buildings, 
large stores, and other places far removed from the home that 
we have, conspicuously in all urban communities, and visibly 
even in rural communities, the phenomenon of women wage 
workers — that is, women who no longer render their service 
in the family unit (and receiving payment, not in money, 
but in kind) but in places and conditions unconnected with 
the home. The United States Census for 1910 shows that of 
all the enumerated inhabitants the following percentages of 
each age group were engaged in " gainful " occupation : ^ 

^Fourteenth Census, IV, 73 

Age 
Age 10-13 Age 14-16 Age 16-20 Age 21-44 45 and upward 

Males. ... 17 per cent 41 per cent 79 per cent 97 per cent 86 per cent 

Females . . 8 per cent 20 per cent 40 per cent 26 per cent 16 per cent 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 417 

Of the more than eight milHon women wage workers (in 
" gainful " occupations) included in these figures, probably 
about one million are domestic servants ; the rest are follow- 
ing occupations away from the home and having no direct 
connection therewith. The figures from previous censuses 
show that the proportions of women wage workers are stead- 
ily increasing (the percentages in 1900 were for the re- 
spective age groups about 6, 18, 32, 21 and 13). 

3. Difficulties of transition to non-domestic employ- 
ments. — The increasing necessities laid upon women to find 
opportunities for productive service away from the home 
have naturally resulted in conflicts of ancient custom with 
new conditions. Where rising standards of living had re- 
leased women from hard and grimy manual occupations — 
tillage of soil, harvesting, milking of cows, drawing of coal 
in mines, wood carrying, fish cleaning and distributing, as 
practiced in Europe, were early tabooed by the prosperous 
American settler for his " women folk " — it has been 
deemed degrading for women to resume them. Probably, 
also, acquired physical disqualifications for such " mascu- 
line " employments, due to more " delicate " rearing, have 
played an important part in preventing any return to them. 

Where men had long monopolized certain attractive oc- 
cupations (preaching, practice of law, medicine, teaching in 
mixed or boys' schools, clerical office work — until after the 
Civil War — "political office-holding," indoor salesmanship 
— until the eighties — telegraphy, machine-shop work, tail- 
oring, dentistry, pharmacy, architecture, and engineering), 
there had naturally developed strong prejudices against the 
entrance of women competitors. All sorts of barriers, some 
due to motives consciously mean and selfish, others to com- 
mendable, even though short-sighted, desires to keep women 
out of " non-wholesome " surroundings, abnormal work, or 
employment that might impair the home, have been raised. 
Very naturally, in those to whom the wish must be father 

2E 



41 8 Vocational Education 

to the thought, it has been conceived that woman's strength 
of body or, no less often, of mind, could not be equal to the 
requirements of the work as standardized for men workers. 

When strikes or war deprive a given field of employment 
of male workers, employers naturally seek to recruit their 
forces with women, if immigrant or colored men are unavail- 
able. This " unfair " competition of women with men 
arouses keen apprehensions and leads to prejudices that long 
survive the events that provoke them. Women workers or- 
ganize, or act in organized ways, less readily or effectively 
than men; hence where the workers of a given field — shoe- 
making, cigarmaking, bookbinding, typesetting, telegraphy, 
tailoring, and other similar fields — have secured and are 
maintaining advantages through organization each threat- 
ened invasion of " scab " women workers is bitterly re- 
sented. In some fields of highly subdivided labor, the su- 
perior nimbleness and powers of concentration of girl work- 
ers are a perpetual irritation to their less dexterous brothers 
and male cousins. 

For these, as well, doubtless, as for more obscure reasons, 
resting on vague instinctive reactions (some of which, per- 
haps, are sounder than appears on the surface), the way of 
woman's advance into the fields of wage-earning work has 
been made painful and often degrading. Nevertheless, op- 
position has steadily given way. There now exist in law or 
fixed custom relatively few obstacles to woman's entry upon 
any calling that may be elected. Vexatious handicaps and 
restrictions of a more or less disguised nature are still found 
in large numbers, of course, especially in transitional stages; 
but substantial and organized opposition is found only where 
invasion threatens to break down the standards of protection 
and compensation painfully secured through long efforts of 
organized labor. 

Hence we can assume the early removal in almost complete 
measure of the factitious barriers to woman's entry upon 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 419 

any field of work she may seek, and her undisturbed right 
to participate in its rewards and to share in responsibihty 
for its development so far as this may be consistent with her 
other obligations to society and to herself. 

4. Social regulation of women's non-domestic work. — 
Statutory regulation of the conditions of women's work rep- 
resents a social tendency of very modern development, and 
yet it is already so deeply rooted in our best ideals and prac- 
tice of social economy as reflected by scientific thought and 
by legislation that we must accept it as an established condi- 
tioning force in relation to woman's place in the modern 
economic world. This regulation by law of the conditions 
under which women may work is unquestionably designed 
in the interests of woman's obligations to society and to her- 
self. 

In America and those other civilized nations that have 
shared in the " industrial revolution " we already see em- 
bodied in legislation many provisions regulating the partici- 
pation of children in wage-earning work; and along with 
these appear statutes governing for women, hours of labor, 
factory conditions, night work, minimum wage, dangerous 
employments, and amount and quality of toil as related to 
time of childbirth. Unless present tendencies shift radi- 
cally, we may expect a continuous development of regulatory 
laws and ordinances of this character; and, if scientific 
knowledge and sound social ideals prevail, we may expect 
them increasingly to provide for the protection of the health, 
moral character, standards of living, and family responsibil- 
ities of the worker as well as, in respects not included in 
these, to insure that she discharge in best practicable ways 
her responsibilities to society as citizen, mother, defender, 
and producer. In the case of any given individual and for 
a given space of time, much of this regulation will seem un- 
duly restrictive and even repressive ; and, indeed, under poor 
direction, it may easily become that, no less than the ancient 



420 Vocational Education 

regulatory ordinances of king, church, and guild. Never- 
theless, social needs here will clearly have the ascendancy, in 
part because of the fact that so many women wage workers 
are young and insufficiently cooperative, and therefore eas- 
ily exploited ; and in part, because of their supposedly low re- 
sisting powers, as compared with men, against low standards 
of living, excessive hours, moral exposure, and physical 
hardship. 

5. The effective rearing of children. — The struggle of 
an individual to live — to obtain a living and to maintain a 
desired standard of comfort — need not necessarily involve 
service valuable to the community nor responsibility for the 
maintenance of a family or the rearing of children. In the 
struggle of any given composite social group to survive and 
advance itself, however, it is inevitably required that first 
consideration be given to the conditions that make for the 
effective rearing of children. But the possible contributions 
respectively of men and women to the rearing of children are 
necessarily differentiated. In the long run a given society 
dare not permit either men or women in any substantial num- 
bers to subordinate their family responsibilities to other ends. 
The pursuit by a people of permissible economic objectives 
must, for the great majority, be in chief measure a means to 
wholesome family life (the central and controlling function 
of which is successful child-rearing), else such a people will 
perish. In some far-off day society may find means of dele- 
gating most of the work of child-rearing to special agencies; 
but current proposals to that end are usually Utopian. 

With advancing standards and more intelligent social and 
private control, we may assume that, as contrasted with the 
present, the following will progressively be the essential 
features of family life as relates to the effective rearing of 
children: (a) the burdens (and compensating satisfactions) 
of rearing children will be more evenly distributed than at 
present — involving somewhat larger families for the more 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 421 

intelligent and prosperous, and somewhat smaller families 
for others than prevail now in America ; (h) for a society not 
willfully static nor deteriorating in numbers, each normal 
family will be expected to bring to maturity three children 
or more according to prevailing rates of marriage, sterility, 
etc. ; (c) marriages will be more intelligently made, and will 
be entered upon with greater preparation for the responsibil- 
ities involved; {d) children, and especially very young chil- 
dren, will be better cared for, and the death-rate among them 
will steadily diminish; (e) until the state subsidizes the rear- 
ing of all children (an expedient frequently proposed, but 
unlikely of adoption in the near future) it will give financial 
assistance only to mothers who, having established approved 
marriages, are through unforeseen contingency deprived of 
the needed cooperation of husband — widows' pensions, 
allowances to wives of drafted soldiers, and injured work- 
ers, etc. ; (/) where service needed in the rearing of children 
can best be given by the mother, she may expect to be forced 
and, if necessary, assisted, to devote herself to that work; 
and where service can best be given by agencies other than 
the home — school education, health inspection, etc. — it is 
to be expected that these will be maintained at public ex- 
pense. 

In general, a sound society must insist on proper and ade- 
quate motherhood, and will protect it as far as is socially 
practicable. 

6. Vocational education for non-domestic employments. 
— By vocational education is here meant any and all forms 
of experience-getting, instruction, training, and supervision 
which finally make the worker productive, including the 
poorly organized training of simple shop experience under 
supervision, as well as the systematized training of appren- 
ticeship and trade school. The very conditions under which 
women have followed productive callings away from the 
home have prevented the development of valuable private or 



422 Vocational Education 

public training except in a few fields, such as nursing, teach- 
ing, and clerical work (chiefly stenography). The woman 
worker has been introduced first as helper to more skilled 
male workers or as a specialist on highly subdivided pro- 
cesses as spinner, cartridge filler, buttonhole-maker, folder, 
garden weeder, can filler, labeler, file clerk. 

Furthermore, she has seldom come in to " learn the busi- 
ness " — as, not infrequently at least, has her brother. She 
has had necessarily the attitude of a casual laborer taking a 
temporary job. Experience convinced her employers that 
in 80 or 90 per cent of all cases she would leave early to get 
married. Often she has been less than a casual laborer; 
she has been a child earning " pin money," and contributing 
for a time toward her own support in her parents' home. 
As a girl she neither wants to stay permanently, nor does 
she care especially to be advanced to more complicated work. 
The very processes by which work has been subdivided and 
mechanized to fit her powers and limitations have wiped 
away traditions of apprenticeship and beliefs in importance 
of definite vocational training. The chief function of the 
employment manager becomes to pick girls of most promise 
of native ability; and the forewoman (or, often, foreman) 
may be trusted soon to " fire " those who could not " make 
good." 

Except in a few lines of work (e.g., telephone service, 
select office service, and department stores catering to custom 
somewhat above the average, in which some good special pri- 
vate vocational training has already been developed) the 
employers of women workers have always been in sharpest 
competition with each other, and ready at all times to 
" steal " each other's best workers ; hence any given employer 
was practically precluded from giving his workers special 
training; he would only find his best workers stolen and 
himself the poorer for his efforts. 

From the standpoint of making the work of young, unin- 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 423 

terested, untrained girl and women workers productive of 
useful service, the modern industrial and commercial mana- 
ger has wrought wonders through his use of machinery and 
organization — as expressed in massing of capital, use of 
inventions, development of speedy power-driven machinery, 
subdivision of process, perfection of supervision, advertis- 
ing for help, penalizing specific forms of incompetency, etc. 
Cloth manufacture, department-store merchandising, cart- 
ridge making, bookbinding, watchmaking, fruit and meat 
canning, cigarette making, clothing manufacture, drug pack- 
ing, telephony — these and many other similar lines repre- 
sent wonderful modern organizations of production; but 
they do not usually involve the systematic vocational educa- 
tion of workers and, probably, may not be expected to do 
so in the near future. The very success of this form of 
enterprise has indeed led to the conviction that training for 
occupation is nonessential where machine production can be 
organized on a gigantic scale — a clear case, of course, of 
reasoning post hoc ergo propter hoc. Because we see a 
thousand productive processes evolved to utilize the services 
of the untrained girl, we assume that the trained girl of equal 
age will find only these processes available for her. But to 
accept this conclusion would mean the abrogation of all 
of society's supposed powers of invention along educational 
lines. Are only competing employers original and inven- 
tive? To train girl workers for non-domestic vocations 
will give us many problems ; and these will be analyzed and 
solved. But it is futile to expect competing employers to 
solve or even to state them for us. 

That woman in the twentieth century will be largely free 
to enter upon any productive work that she may elect, sub- 
ject to that degree and kind of state regulation that will in- 
sure protection of the state's interest in her well-being; and 
that it is possible and profitable for society collectively, 



424 Vocational Education 

through the state, to undertake to fit her for such work — 
these are the preHminary theses upon which to base a study 
of the numberless particular problems for the individual 
woman and for society which have already developed and 
which may be expected to continue to develop in connection 
with her efforts to fulfil the destiny laid upon her originally, 
we are assured, by Eve, who, in the words of William 
Vaughn Moody, lived to sing to the Lord : 

Behold, against thy will, against thy word, 
Against the wrath and warning of thy sword 
Eve has been Eve, O Lord ! 

A pitcher filled, she comes back from the brook, 
A wain she comes, laden with mellow ears ; 
She is a roll inscribed, a prophet's book 
Writ strong with characters. 

B. UNSETTLED PROBLEMS 

The economic transitions of recent centuries, and espe- 
cially in the countries where " industrialism " has progressed 
farthest, have given rise to many difficult social problems, 
some of which, at least, seem more acutely to affect women 
than men. Among the most pressing of these problems are 
those discussed below. 

1. Combining domestic with non-domestic work. — Dur- 
ing the transition period wherein has developed extensive 
employment of women in non-domestic industries, there ap- 
pear many cases in which women simultaneously carry on 
homemaking and work outside the home. 

(a) Tillage of the soil, harvesting, fish cleaning and dry- 
ing, milking, herding, wood gathering, and some other semi- 
domestic occupations, having been in large part woman's 
work long before the " industrial revolution," have persisted 
in all primitive communities. Colored women in the South, 
peasant women in all the continental countries of Europe and 
Asia, and recent immigrants to America, by reducing home 
work to a minimum, by developing much muscular power 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 425 

and physical endurance, are obviously able to bear many 
children, to bring some of these to a rugged maturity, and at 
the same time to perform what is frequently described as a 
'' man's work " away from the home. 

(h) In manufacturing and commercial centers, there are 
found many families in poor financial circumstances. In 
these, fathers are usually dead, deserters, invalided, or dis- 
sipated, or else are employed irregularly or in some un- 
skilled, poorly paid work. As a consequence, the mothers, 
simplifying their home work to the utmost, seek wage-earn- 
ing employments. They work in mills, as '' day " domes- 
tics, as cleaners of office buildings, and in other fields in 
which unskilled laborers, made energetic by desperate ne- 
cessity, are in demand. 

(c) A few women of superior talent — actresses, sing- 
ers, teachers, writers, saleswomen — have, after marriage, 
continued to follow apart from the home the productive 
service in which they had become adept before marriage. 
As a historic fact, many of these women have, naturally or 
voluntarily, remained sterile; but in other instances they 
have reared normal families, aided by employed domestic 
service. 

{d) A small number of mothers, having brought a nor- 
mal number of children to that degree of maturity where 
their immediate demands for " mother-care " have been less 
pressing, have resumed former employments or undertaken 
new work away from the home, sometimes as a means of 
furthering personal development or as a means of adding to 
family income. 

2. Homemaking as an exclusive vocation. — But in the 
large majority of cases in all countries where a substantial 
portion of the population has reached a comfortable stand- 
ard of living, work outside the home for the married 
woman is held in disapproval both by expert and by popular 
opinion. 



426 Vocational Education 

(a) Where young men and young women are both en- 
gaged in wage-earning, it is customary for them to abstain 
from marriage until, in each case, the man's income is be- 
Heved to be sufficient to " maintain a home " — which im- 
phes the expectation that the wife shall be relieved of obliga- 
tion to work for wages and shall be free to give her time ex- 
clusively to the upkeep of the home and the care of the 
children expected in it. 

(h) The laboring man whose wife must "go out to 
work " becomes an object of pity or contempt according to 
the degree to which he is culpably responsible for such 
necessity. 

(c) It is generally conceded that in the case of all fam- 
ilies having young children and modal incomes — in Amer- 
ica this might well mean children under fourteen or 
fifteen — the absence of the mother in wage-earning work 
operates to the serious physical and moral detriment of the 
children unless substitute care be provided. Such detri- 
ment must, obviously, be interpreted in terms of an ap- 
proved real or expected standard of living, as this makes for 
physical and moral wholesomeness. It is clear that a rising 
standard of living means new requirements on mother care. 

(d) Families in exceptionally good financial circum- 
stances have long followed the practice of delegating care of 
children in large part. Employed nurses and tutors take 
charge during younger years; and in England the boarding 
school claims many boys and some girls after nine or ten 
years of age. Whether the rearing thus provided is equal 
or superior to that which the mother, devoting her energies 
primarily to her children, could give, is yet an open ques- 
tion; but in view of the very small number of families to 
whom this delegation of parental responsibilities is finan- 
cially practicable, the question is of small importance. Once 
in a million cases, perhaps, we can find a Madame Schu- 
mann-Heink who can, by virtue of unusual physical strength 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 427 

and exceptional talent for a non-domestic vocation, render 
great service away from the home and at the same time 
rear a fine family ; but social programs can hardly be based 
on cases so exceptional. 

3. Demands for '' better families." — In the evolution 
of conscious social policies relative to the homemaking voca- 
tion, to supplement the present social inheritance of cus- 
toms and traditions based partly upon old human instincts 
and partly upon empirical experience accumulated un- 
der the spur of necessity, it is clearly urgent that 
the conditions of effective homemaking in accordance 
with modern approvable standards should be analyzed, 
delimited, and described. What constitutes optimum 
''mother-care" of infants and children? To what extent, 
under what circumstances, and at what financial cost can that 
care, in whole or in part, be delegated? To what extent, 
under what circumstances, and to what advantage, financial 
or other, can the pursuit of occupations supplemental to, or 
in substitution of, mother-care be profitably followed by the 
mother ? 

It is needless to state here that from the standpoint of so- 
cial evolution the primary function of the home is the 
rearing of children during the prolonged years of " infancy " 
which has become a racial condition in the human species. 
The adequate maintenance of the home, at least in temperate 
zones, has entailed the monogamous and life-long union of 
the father and mother, and, as a consequence, the home 
serves the important secondary function of being a place of 
rest and recreation for the father, who is of course essen- 
tially a non-domestic worker. The mother, as homekeeper 
and children's guardian, develops various kinds of domestic 
productive service, which are best generalized under the 
term " homemaking." In all normal societies it can be as- 
sumed that the two parents contribute equally to the com- 
plete support of the home. Under special circumstances — 



428 Vocational Education 

e.g. where men extensively develop social habits of dissi- 
pation, where prosperous men put a premium on the decora- 
tive functions of wives and daughters, in settlement of the 
frontier, or where, after a long period in which men have 
specialized in defensive functions and women in manual toil, 
conditions of peace are established which do not for a time 
diminish the woman's work, but permit the man to exist in 
comparative idleness — the men in some of these cases, or 
the women in others, are forced to make a disproportionate 
contribution, whether of labor or of suffering; but such con- 
ditions occur only in exceptional classes and periods. 

Rising standards of living and changing conditions due 
to civilization impose upon both parents larger responsibil- 
ities, often only partially offset by increase of knowledge, 
of productive power due to invention, etc. A longer period 
of parental protection for children; diminished mortality 
and morbidity rates ; more adequate nurture, clothing, shel- 
ter, and education ; more " social " advantages ; later entry 
upon self-supporting employment; a ''better start in life" 
— these become goals, individual and social, of family rear- 
ing: in all civilized societies. The three most visible effects 
of these rising standards are: the mother must give fuller 
personal care to her children, especially in their younger 
years; the father must increase his output of productive serv- 
ice in order to procure the exchangeable goods necessary 
for family support; and the state undertakes certain func- 
tions — e.g. education, and, in less measure, health super- 
vision and relief of destitute — which parents cannot well 
perform. 

A secondary social product of these rising standards ap- 
pearing in recent years, and especially in most progressive 
societies — as judged at least by conventional standards — 
is the voluntary diminution of the number of children to be 
reared, and, by inference and expectation at least, the more 
adequate rearing of this diminished number. A first man- 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 429 

ifestation of this tendency is found in the postponement of 
marriage among many classes, and especially the profes- 
sional; a second, in the diminished marriage rate, at least 
in some societies, of the socially "unfit" — the dissipated, 
the defective, and the ne'er-do-well; a third, in the social 
disapproval of excessively large families — the "rabbit 
warren" type — especially among the poor; and a fourth, 
in voluntary restriction among the sensitive and intelligent 
of the size of family to that which is in a measure com- 
patible with the interests of the parents in the proper rearing 
of their children, the conservation of the health of the 
mother, and the building up of a capital reserve for the par- 
ents in their old age. 

That the possibilities of restricting size of family in the 
interests of quality of human beings reared can be and are 
subject to gross abuses is unquestionable. Without doubt, 
an undue number of men now forego marriage altogether, 
some from the most selfish of motives. Some men, and 
doubtless some women, remain celibate because of the ac- 
quisition of excessively developed qualities of so-called re- 
finement, which represent in reality only refined selfishness. 
It is certain that in countries like France, New Zealand, 
England, and America, where social caste has broken down 
and ascent in the social scale is easy, a disastrously large 
proportion of married couples evade altogether or in large 
part their obligations to society as regards insuring families 
of proper size. Motives for this are varied, ranging from 
the completely selfish to those involving, perhaps, a mis- 
guided sense of social gain to result from the success of the 
unhandicapped man in art, science, business leadership, war 
leadership, or social prominence. 

"Down to Gehenna or up to the throne, 
He travels fastest who travels alone." 

It is still, of course, a complex unsettled problem as to 
how far the entire range of powers and capacities of the 



430 Vocational Education 

mother of a normal family, capable of being devoted to 
productive service, may not be required for child-rearing, 
especially during the years from marriage to the time when 
the youngest child shall be at least twelve years of age. In 
the case of a woman marrying at twenty-three years of age 
and rearing four children, it is reasonable to assume that her 
personal care will be closely required on behalf of her chil- 
dren until she is forty-two years of age. It is furthermore 
here offered as a contention that by all modern standards 
the family responsibilities of such a mother during her 
twenty most active years must claim substantially all her 
effective working time and energy. Society may be ex- 
pected increasingly to look upon the supersession of maternal 
duties, either by voluntarily assumed or by enforced labor 
in non-domestic vocations, as in the nature of a misfortune 
to the rising generation. Variations from this principle 
there will undoubtedly be ; but they will arise from circum- 
stances so exceptional that they will be of the nature of 
those variations from the normal, the justification of which 
on the part of given individuals will entail a substantial 
burden of proof. 

4. Domestic versus non-domestic vocations. — What are 
the relationships likely to prove most common between 
woman's work in homemaking and her work in non-domes- 
tic employments? The history of recent decades points to 
the following possible answers : 

(a) The postponement of marriage together with the 
withdrawal of many kinds of productive work from the 
home has rendered it necessary for the daughters of the fam- 
ily, no less than the sons, in large numbers to seek openings 
for productive service away from the home. This is espe- 
cially true of communities devoted largely to industrial and 
commercial pursuits. For example, the Census of 1910 
shows the following proportions (percentages) of women of 
each age group engaged in " gainful " occupations : 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 431 



State 


Females 
10-13 Years 


Females 
14-15 Years 


Females 
16-20 Years 


Females 
21-44 Years 


Females 45 
AND Upward 


Massachusetts. . . 
Iowa 


Percentage 

.3 

.7 

1.3 

.7 


Percentage 

24 

9 
21 

4 


Percentage 

60 
29 
44 
22 


Percentage 

39 
20 
23 
16 


Percentage 

18 

9 

13 

10 


Pennsylvania 

Kansas 





All of these figures are rendered difficult of interpreta- 
tion for the purposes in hand here by the fact that the fourth 
age group includes at least two or three and, for certain 
higher economic levels, probably four to six years of the 
usual " premarriage " wage working years of the women 
involved. Nevertheless, it is clear that in all states, and con- 
spicuously in those predominantly industrial and commer- 
cial, from one fourth to nearly two thirds of all women 
give their ''premarriage" years (after school years close) 
to non-domestic employments; and there is little reason to 
expect that this condition will change in the direction of in- 
creasing the proportion of domestic work. 

(&) Where regular home employment is insufficient for 
mother and growing daughters numerous attempts are made 
to bring wage-earning, non-domestic work into the home. 
In cities the addressing of envelopes, feather-work, novelty 
work, and piecework (for example, sewing on of buttons, 
etc., on manufactured clothing) are sought. In a few coun- 
try areas the manufacture of cheap cigars by the farmers' 
wives and daughters in the home has proven profitable. But 
no general developments in this direction can now be traced, 
and the trend of " sweatshop " legislation, as well as the 
opposition of social students to the probable incident abuses 
(hygienic, forced child labor, etc.), would seem to indicate 
that such forms of work have little future. The develop- 
ment of electrically driven textile and other machinery has 
led to some extravagant hopes that each home may once 
again become what it formerly was in some cases — a httle 



432 Vocational Education 

workshop for the whole family. For the present these ex- 
pectations must be regarded as Utopian. Problems of or- 
ganization, supervision, and transportation seem insur- 
mountable. The natural lines of development of non-domes- 
tic work for rural women would seem to be in the direction 
of soil tillage and light stock raising; but these also as " ex- 
tra-home " vocations for women seem to be diminishing 
rather than increasing. 

(c) It is here assumed that, as stated before, society can- 
not well expect or even permit non-domestic '' full-time " 
wage work for women after marriage and during the time 
when children are still young. 

{d) Could " part-time " wage-earning work for mothers 
be approved? If a mother cannot teach a full day, could 
she not teach a half day? Could not mothers living near 
factories give four or five hours daily to wage-earning? 
These questions are often raised; and public interest in them 
is such that much experimentation may be expected in the 
near future. The theoretic possibilities of good arrange- 
ments of this sort seem strong; but some of the most for- 
midable obstacles to them are generally ignored. Modern 
production involves a constantly enlarging proportion of 
capital (tools, housing, etc.) and organization (supervision, 
regimentation, routine) in proportion to labor. To an in- 
creasing extent labor must work according to schedule, else 
waste of capital (idle tools, etc.) and excessive cost of 
" overhead " service — supervision, planning, etc. — become 
inevitable. The outlook for part-time service, especially if 
the *' part-time " must also be somewhat irregular, is not 
promising, but nevertheless requires fullest experimentation. 

{e) Can women, after children are grown, find profitable 
non-domestic employment? The answer involves the same 
difficulties as those discussed under (J) above, and the 
added one that these possible workers would be past the age 
at which they could readily learn new processes. Here, 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 433 

also, close analytical studies of existing situations and exper- 
imentation seem highly desirable. 

5. What are '' suitable " types of work for women f — 

(a) It can readily be assumed that most women, by in- 
stinct and as a result of custom inheritance, are peculiarly 
qualified for '' homemaking " work as that has evolved 
through the ages. But where homemaking is required of 
a highly trained and gifted woman, it may seem in individual 
instances socially less productive than other work for her. 
To what extent and under what circumstances can she dele- 
gate homemaking? Some problems arising in this connec- 
tion have been discussed above. 

{b) It is probable that old preconceptions as to the *' in- 
tellectual unfitness " of women for certain types of work will 
have to be put into cold storage during the twentieth cen- 
tury, at least until a time when more scientific evidence rela- 
tive to general dissimilarities between men and women as 
to intellectual quality shall have been accumulated and inter- 
preted. Only relatively few men, of course, are capable of 
meeting the intellectual standards set by the age for scien- 
tific research, practice of a profession, military leadership, 
teaching advanced students, literary production, business 
leadership, etc. Whether, given the same social in- 
centives and opportunities, the percentage of women who 
could attain to equal proficiency is smaller or larger is cer- 
tainly not yet known. 

(c) Among economically prosperous peoples it seems 
that women develop less physical strength and those kinds of 
hardihood that we customarily identify with work in the 
open than do men. As a consequence, it is customary to as- 
sume that women cannot do many of the kinds of heavy 
work in which men frequently engage. This impression is 
heightened by the fact that among many of the best-known 
mammals and birds the female is less strongly buih than 
the male. On the other hand, among primitive peoples and 



2 F 



434 Vocational Education 

the economically less prosperous tillers of the soil to-day 
(Asia, Central Europe) women by custom carry on much 
heavy work, and, apparently, develop bones and muscles 
hardly less strong and capable of enduring long and heavy 
work than those of men. At all stages in recorded history, 
where the ideal of the '' decorative " woman has prevailed 
among the leisure class or workers of high rank, girls of 
these classes have been reared with standards of small feet, 
slender waists, half-developed muscles, and soft skins in 
view. The product has often been a much, if not exces- 
sively, feminized woman, who, among her other defects of 
specialization toward the " beautiful," includes a greatly 
diminished capacity for heavy physical toil and endurance. 
The same results would happen and frequently have hap- 
pened to men as effects of similar ideals and consequent 
practices. How far, therefore, we must accept as inherent 
woman's alleged natural disqualifications for heavy work — 
lifting, tilling, building, digging, portering, mining, etc. — 
seems yet an open question. 

If, however, it should prove that, naturally, a smaller 
body and less physical strength are the portion of women in 
general, or that women should, on account of possible in- 
juries to organs essential to child-bearing, be spared " heavy 
work," then the consequences in vocational education will be 
important, although probably less important as mechanisms 
employing natural powers become perfected. The same re- 
sults would follow, of course, if it should appear that those 
decorative qualities in women which seem to require certain 
kinds of physical underdevelopment should prove to be more 
than adventitious assets to society. Conceivably, it may be 
very important, from the standpoints of aesthetic demands, 
sexual selection, etc., that all women should be schooled and 
shaped to the physical attractiveness and delicacy formerly 
possible only to the wives, daughters, and specialized en- 
tertainers of the conquering and the wealth-holding classes. 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 435 

If this be so, then we shall differentiate indoor salesman- 
ship, teaching, light factory work, and the like as suitable 
employments for young women during their premarriage 
years, because, on the one hand, these young women, softly 
reared, will prove unadapted to heavier work, and because, 
on the other hand, they will thereby avoid those forms of 
toil which most handicap them as regards physical attractive- 
ness. Obviously, the unsettled problems here are numer- 
ous, intricate, and perhaps, until we shall know more about 
social psychology, baffling. But it is highly probable that, 
owing to natural or social fitness, men will prevailingly con- 
tinue to fill some occupations and women others. The rea- 
sons for this differentiation may be economic rather than 
physical and social. But, as the place and circumstances of 
a given occupation change, it may well pass from one sex to 
another. Milking, baking, and skin-dressing, once tied up 
with the home, first were women's work ; but, away from the 
home, they become men's occupations. The work of the 
street-car conductor was formerly heavy and disagreeable to 
an extent that marked it out manifestly for men; but when 
the job becomes one chiefly of collecting fares in the pro- 
tected entrance of a car, there is no reason why it should not 
be given to a woman, or, more properly, a girl. 

6. Can men and women workers expect equal pay for 
equal work ? — There are many obscure elements involved 
in this problem. It has previously been suggested that, 
under average economic conditions, women do as much 
work as men. This is very different from saying that men 
and women can compete on equal terms in non-domestic (or, 
obviously also, domestic) forms of employment. The fol- 
lowing special problems are involved : 

(a) It is essential that '' pay for work " should be 
thought of as far as practicable in terms of exchange of 
economic utilities and not in terms of the counter '' money." 
Men and women work, primarily, in order that they may 



436 Vocational Education 

produce, beyond the products of their labor which they can 
themselves consume, products which can be exchanged for 
the required products of others. It is practically impossi- 
ble to designate absolute ''values" for these products; all 
experience shows that, except in the case of collective inter- 
ference with demand in the interest of health or safety, the 
" values " attached to various forms of service and product 
are the resultants of demand and supply. Private individual 
or corporate effort can interfere somewhat with the oper- 
ation of the law of supply and demand in regulation of 
values (as expressed in prices), as through corporate mo- 
nopoly, trade-union regulation, fashion, advertising, educa- 
tion ; and the state through minimum wage laws, sumptuary 
regulations, state monopoly, can also cause some marked 
divergences from the normal values determined by the free 
operation of the law. Nevertheless, like sea-level as a base 
of earth measurements, or year-round average temperature 
in a given area, the resultant values given by the law of sup- 
ply and demand can never be ignored or greatly departed 
from. In general, then, it may be assumed that when the 
demand for the services or the products of any class of 
workers is large and the supply of such service or product 
small, a relatively large quantity of " exchangeable " goods 
will be offered; and, when reversed conditions prevail, a 
small amount; and that neither custom, private monopoly, 
nor law can more than slightly affect this resultant. 

(b) Society does not now subject children, dependent 
poor people, the sick or the aged, those severely handicapped 
physically, or those who, like soldiers, are temporarily 
drafted for pubHc service, to the struggle involved in the 
competitive industrial order. But it does require normal 
adults to be " self-supporting," which means, in fact, that 
these are expected to sell their services in the best possible 
market, and that buyers of such services or their products 
will strive to get them at the best possible (buyer's) price. 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 437 

Broadly speaking, then, a given normal child from birth to 
perhaps sixteen consumes more economic service day by 
day than he produces, the adverse balance being largest from 
perhaps nine to sixteen. Thereafter he produces more than 
he consumes until perhaps sixty-five years of age, the max- 
imum favorable balance being between the years twenty-five 
and fifty. From sixty-five to death at eighty, this individual 
consumes more than he produces, apart from the service 
rendered to society by even the very old man as " capital 
holder." It is from sixteen to sixty-five, in this case, that 
the law of supply and demand regulating wages operates. 

An extreme school of coUectivists would abrogate the 
operation of the law of supply and demand by establishing 
the principle '* to each according to his needs, from each 
according to his ability," which is now, on any given eco- 
nomic plane, the custom-based practice as regards children. 
But for the present we must assume among independent 
adult workers the nearly free operation of competition in 
buying and selling services (or their products). Under 
these conditions, subject to slight ofi^sets from custom and 
monopolization, '' equal pay for equal work " will certainly 
prevail ; and the pay will always be that for which the cheap- 
est worker can be had. This process will necessarily be ob- 
scured (perhaps in a measure departed from) in public serv- 
ice {e.g. public school teaching) where standards of service 
rendered are indefinite and the employer — ''the public" — 
seems possessed of unlimited means of adding to the com- 
pensation of workers alleged to be " underpaid." Simi- 
larly, in the case of large corporations having great assets 
and not subject to keen competition, sentiment or fear may 
for a time force wage rates to artificial levels, doubtless 
often the case with " high officials " and sometimes with the 
rank and file of workers. 

(c) But in almost every case it is practically certain that 
men and women will not work alongside each other on terms 



438 Vocational Education 

of economic equality. The " pull " of economic demand 
for persons of a given grade of native ability, training, and 
adaptability will not operate equally. For example, to one 
thousand men chosen at random, economic opportunities 
are now available of such kind and quantity as to make, let 
us say, elementary school teaching at present rates of com- 
pensation a tenth or twentieth best calling; whereas to an 
equal number of women it is now a first, second, or, possibly 
in some cities, a third best calling. Naturally and inevitably, 
unless society places a special premium on men because they 
can render a kind of service that women cannot render, such 
teaching will become " woman's work " and the men will 
strive toward those callings which pay better. 

(d) A very large factor in this economic differentiation, 
although obscurely recognized at present, is the difference 
in demands being made upon men and women workers re- 
spectively. For a given economic level, it may be assumed 
that during the years constituting the " premarriage " pe- 
riod for women in large numbers, youths and maidens will 
impose demands for wages only slightly above the living ex- 
penses of the individual. But between ages twenty-five and 
fifty, in the large (and therefore controlling) majority of 
cases the situations of permanent men and women workers 
(in the case of women, chiefly celibate) change in marked 
degree. The permanently single woman at twenty-six may, 
and, in the case of teachers, nurses, etc., often does, have as 
many '' dependents " as men of the same age; but at forty- 
six society expects the man to have four to seven depend- 
ents, whereas the single woman, who is the only frequent 
competitor, now, commonly, has only herself. Because 
this is so in the controlling number of cases for a given so- 
cial plane of intelligence, standard of living, and natural 
competency, all components of the '' demand " made by the 
class collectively for exchangeable goods (the measure of 
normal wages), men workers from twenty-five to fifty will 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 439 

strive to preempt fields into which women cannot fit; and, 
equally, women will be given almost exclusive possession of 
those forms of work which they can do best. Some of the 
stronger of the women will always be looking longingly into 
the fields given to the men; and their potential rather than 
real competition may be expected always to be a source of 
irritation, apprehension, and recriminating discussion. 

7. Women in the professions and leadership. — To many 
young women of ability and ambition come, very naturally, 
aspirations to prepare themselves for those professional call- 
ings, as well as forms of leadership, for which many years 
of expensive training and of poorly remunerated appren- 
ticeship are essential. Many capable women of middle age 
who are in their own thoughts permanent celibates, become 
ambitious to be promoted to positions of authority and 
leadership for which their abilities and experience seem to 
qualify them. In these cases women have always encoun- 
tered obstacles more or less factitious, the vestigial remains 
of which still are found. 

The problems involved here are by no means solved, how- 
ever, when artificial barriers to training and promotion have 
been removed. Take, for example, the practice of medicine 
as a profession; should we recommend it as a desirable voca- 
tion to a young woman of requisite ability and interest? 
Persons preparing for this profession usually embark on its 
study at or about twenty to twenty- three years of age. 
They will probably be thirty years of age before they can 
expect to be self-supporting. Cost of training is heavy, 
both to the individual and to the state (or, in lieu of state 
support, philanthropic endowments provided for the encour- 
agement of this professional training). Granting that a 
properly qualified woman who remains single can build up 
and maintain a good medical practice, should the young 
woman be encouraged to undertake the preliminary steps 
involved ? We should first, of course, decide as far as prac- 



440 Vocational Education 

ticable whether, for the woman prepared to practice medi- 
cine, homemaking and family rearing are compatible with a 
professional career. Instances of the successful union of 
the two we have, of course ; but do they prove the desirabil- 
ity of the attempt in general? Or should we assume that 
the woman who wishes to prepare herself for a difficult pro- 
fession should, in effect, pledge herself to celibacy ? 

Similar problems arise in connection with leadership as 
found in such posts as foreman, school principal, depart- 
ment-store buyer, hotel manager, etc. Most of the women 
who work at teaching, manufacturing, store salesmanship, 
and clerical service are young; during their earlier years of 
service they usually expect to marry, and often their interests 
in matrimonial prospects constitute an absorbing preoccu- 
pation. At the time when the best men workers in these 
fields are just beginning to feel that their experience con- 
stitutes a solid basis for further study, many of the best 
women workers terminate their wage-earning careers. Those 
who find it desirable or necessary to go on are apt to come 
late to the conviction that they should begin to qualify them- 
selves for promotion to directive work. Should we endeavor 
to induce the ablest of these workers early to begin to plan 
for promotion ? The situation in public education is a good 
example. From 75 to 90 per cent of all teachers in the ele- 
mentary and high schools are women. Beginners of both 
sexes start on a substantial parity as regards compensation 
and duties. But positions of direction go chiefly to men. 
Prepossessions of employing authorities — that women 
principals cannot manage big boys, that women teachers do 
not work so well under women principals — play a part in 
this, but probably not a great part in recent years. More 
marked is the indisposition of women teachers (except 
kindergartners) during the ages from twenty-four to thirty 
to take leads, to show professional initiative, to prepare for 
advanced work. 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 441 

Obviously, problems involved in women's relationship to 
vocations exacting long preparation must be studied in the 
light of agreement upon principles (or well-supported hy- 
potheses at least) as to the desirable attitude of women 
toward family life, and necessary limitations imposed by 
family life. 

8. The '' college woman!' — Only within recent years 
have women in large numbers sought a college education. 
Now they seem likely to exceed the number of men in liberal- 
arts courses. The relation of a " liberal-arts education," 
leading to the degree of A.B., Ph.B., LL.B., or non-technical 
B.S., to prospective vocations, is yet a matter of uncertainty 
to the public and, it would also seem, to college professors. 
No one can pretend that a general college course is voca- 
tional in any definite sense, except possibly for some depart- 
mental work in high-school teaching — and that is the case 
not so much because any college prepares for that work as 
because high-school teaching itself is not yet, in America, 
based upon professional standards. 

Nevertheless, the colleges generally do not make the actual 
functions of a college education clear to their students or 
to the public. College professors, in debates and articles, 
defend affirmative answers to the question, " Does a college 
education pay? " without distinguishing sharply between the 
'* paying " which is essentially financial and the outcome of 
successful participation in vocations, and those other kinds 
of " paying " which are the effect of enrichment in personal 
culture, enhanced values in citizenship, greater control of 
health, and the like. 

It will prove, of course, very hard to ascertain whether a 
college education ever or generally pays in the first sense. 
College students, and, still more, college graduates, repre- 
sent of course the picked personalities of the time and 
regions to which they belong. Only persons of superior 
heredity, superior rearing, and superior lower education, in 



442 Vocational Education 

general, go to college. Success (as commonly esteemed) 
in vocational, as well as in other activities, is, in general, 
assured for these superior persons. Whether a general 
college education adds to prospects for success in a vocation 
is clearly not certain, notwithstanding the blind devotion of 
many college professors to the magic of *' mental discipline." 
That a college education '' pays " through enrichment of 
personal culture and general social or civic usefulness is 
probable, otherwise the " liberal-arts -courses " lose all excuse 
for being. 

Now the situation confronting women graduating from 
general college courses is difficult. They are naturally 
superior persons. They are not generally committed to op- 
portunities for homemaking careers. They want to be self- 
supporting. They dislike to enter upon "unskilled work." 
Their mature abilities and, as they often think, their educa- 
tion qualify them for something better. What are the 
possibilities ? Their brothers used to feel the same ambition 
to begin high up the ladder of earning and responsibility; 
but now the men usually know enough either to go to a 
vocational (professional) school after leaving college or 
else begin at the bottom of the ladder on a railroad, in a 
broker's office, or even on a farm. But there are few 
vocational schools open to these women; their mothers fre- 
quently oppose their beginning at " the bottom " of any 
ladder. What can they do ? Trifle away time entertaining 
and being entertained, awaiting the expected " engagement " 
to enter upon the vocation of homemaking? Confessedly, 
present conditions present here more unsolved than solved 
problems. 

9. Effects of mechanisation and regimentation. — Cur- 
rent tendencies toward the mechanization of industrial pro- 
cesses and the regimentation of workers are strong. It is the 
writer's conviction that further evolution of these tendencies 
is inevitable. Already it is clear that mechanization of work 



1 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 443 

and subdivision of process greatly increase the variety and 
range of opportunities open to unskilled and immature girls 
— they can readily become " tenders " of even complicated 
machines. It is probable that " machine-tending " will 
spread. Harvesting, tillage, even milking and ditch-digging, 
are now done in part by easily managed machines. Could 
not women drive street cars, electric locomotives, traction- 
drawn plows, automatic fodder-grinders, as well as adding- 
machines, looms, tool-grinders, power-driven sewing ma- 
chines? Machinery makes a given quantity of productive 
work easier, and more or less interesting and stimulating. 
There are as yet many unsolved problems here, and they are 
for the moment at least of even more concern to women than 
to men, because w^omen more readily than men fall victims 
in the numerous pathological situations incident to, if not 
even in some cases inherent in, " modern " industrialism. 

10. General education. — In all the more progressive 
American states all girls (as well as boys) are required to 
attend full-time day schools of general education between 
the ages of six and fourteen. A constantly increasing pro- 
portion of young persons from the more prosperous families 
attend, in addition, high schools (whose primary purposes 
are also found in the field of general, as distinguished from 
vocational, education) for one or more years, while the 
ambitious daughters of the very prosperous go also to 
college. 

The objectives actually realized through this general 
education (or, in its higher stages, better named, " liberal " 
education) have not yet been definitely ascertained or 
described, especially in the upper grades and liberal-arts 
colleges. In the minds of many persons these objectives 
include some having relation to vocational fitness. It is 
obvious, of course, that a person unable to read or write is 
automatically debarred thereby from many non-manual 
vocations. But it is not so clear that a general high-school 



444 Vocational Education 

education is essential to the pursuit of higher vocations, 
pubHc opinion to the contrary notwithstanding. The fact 
that girls or boys graduating from high school are, on the 
whole, a " selected " group (as regards native abilities, good 
early nurture, effective character formation in the home, 
etc.), and, therefore, likely to succeed well in vocational pur- 
suits which they undertake and to give satisfaction to their 
employers, has, owing to the prevalent habit of reasoning 
easily post hoc ergo propter hoc, caused employers and even 
parents to associate success with the high-school education 
itself — as cause and effect. 

But, as an accompaniment of the development of more 
definite plans for direct vocational education, it is becoming 
increasingly evident that general or liberal education has, 
and can have, little positive relationship to vocational com- 
petency. The primary objectives of effective general edu- 
cation are to be found in personal culture, civic and moral 
strength, and physical well-being, as these constitute desir- 
able assets among men and women quite irrespective of 
vocation. The quality of the physical, social (civic and 
moral), and cultural education now given in upper grades, 
high schools, and colleges leaves much to be desired, perhaps 
in largest degree as it affects girls and women. Much of it 
rests on psychological assumptions that are largely wrong. 
Its specific objectives have been determined in hard-and- 
fast form frequently by authorities (like committees on 
college admission) who have very slight knowledge of the 
actual qualities, powers, and capacities of those for whom 
they are prescribing, and even less of accurate knowledge of 
the social conditions to which these young women should be 
adjusted for later life and in which they can render valuable 
service. Nevertheless, some important advances have been 
made in recent years and greater ones are in prospect in 
proportion as education becomes more scientific as regards 
its aims and methods. 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 445 

But it is now rather clear that vocational education and 
comprehensive general education cannot effectively be car- 
ried on side by side. The one tends to exclude the other or 
rather to take a primary place in the interests and the atten- 
tion of the learner. Up to fifteen or seventeen or nineteen 
or twenty-one years of age, according to strength of intel- 
lectual interests, family economic circumstances, and social 
incentives generally, youths can be led easily to give primary 
attention to *' growth," development, and training toward 
the non-vocational activities of life. As incidental and sec- 
ondary to this liberal education they can readily be induced 
to " work for wages " after school hours and during vaca- 
tions, to read about '' careers," and even to study trigonome- 
try, business English, or other subjects of a demonstrably 
" prevocational " character for ascertained vocations. 

When, on the other hand, the time comes — in the case 
of a few at fourteen, for many at sixteen and at eighteen, 
and for the exceptional at twenty or twenty-two — for. the 
youth to enter upon a vocation, or upon specific and demon- 
strably functioning training therefor, as a result of the 
interplay of his own instinctive development with the pres- 
sure of social forces upon him, then he tends, in response 
to a very real natural incentive as well as wise customs 
pressing upon him from society, to give to his vocation the 
lion's share of his interest and effort. None of us could 
well wish it otherwise. But there is one course which should 
be followed in the case of the young person concentrating 
on the earlier stages (as learner or operative) of his voca- 
tion; outside the hours — usually the best of the working 
(iay — given to that he should be induced, even aided by 
supplemental training and instruction and by the public pro- 
vision of suitable means, if necessary, to give his leisure 
hours to higher rather than to lower physical, civic, and 
cultural pursuits. If, for example, a girl of sixteen in a 
clothing factory or in a " power operating " school prepara- 



44^ Vocational Education 

tory thereto is giving fifty-four hours per week to learning 
or practicing her vocation, then she should be assisted and 
inspired to devote a reasonable number of her leisure hours 
— from thirty to fifty per week — to those extravocational 
activities that will most enrich her life, continue the growth 
of her personality, and offset the inevitably cramping effects 
of her vocational pursuits — since all vocations, even those 
of homemaking, elementary-school teaching, and nursing, 
have their '' cramping " effects no less certainly than dress- 
making, cigarette making, spinning, waiting on table, and 
selling in a department store. 

Now the time at which " full-time " general education 
should or will cease depends upon many conditions. For 
many girls and boys in our schools intellectual interests seem 
greatly to have flagged before fifteen years of age. Where 
the home economic interests are poor, where the father of 
four or six children is carrying the burden of supporting an 
expensive family on a workingman's wages, sensitive chil- 
dren at fifteen or sixteen years of age become eager to help 
carry the family's load. Some of these children become 
interested in earning money wherewith to purchase com- 
modities and amusements attractive to themselves. In the 
case of many city boys of good physical development, the 
instinctive desire to be doing something " heavy " or " use- 
ful " with their muscles doubtless often exerts a strong 
pressure toward " getting to work." Now that it has be- 
come customary for a large proportion of girls to become 
wage workers away from the home, the same social pressures 
are doubtless felt by them as by the boys. Other consid- 
erations also affect entrance upon wage-earning employ- 
ments. For many trades the age of sixteen is, or rather 
was formerly, looked upon as a desirable time for beginning 
apprenticeship. The repellent character of the work offered 
during the first two years of the usual high-school course 
for pupils who have no exj)ectations of finishing the course 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 447 

has the effect of rendering all school work intensely dis- 
tasteful. 

It is to be expected that workers in vocational guidance 
will ere long have given us some standards to guide us in 
advising girls when to substitute a vocation or vocational 
training as the central interest of the working day for the 
work of the school of " general " or " liberal " education. 
The naive assumptions of academic schoolmasters that one 
" cannot have too much of general education " are, of 
course, essentially e:\; parte contentions. The vague con- 
victions of these same authorities that pupils will continue 
to profit materially from further attendance on schools of 
general learning as long as they attend are probably widely 
at variance with the facts, at least as schools and courses 
are now provided for youths from twelve to eighteen years 
of age. More to be approved, perhaps, at least in urban 
environments and under sharply competitive industrial con- 
ditions, is the contention that the longer pupils remain in 
school the better prepared they will be, in maturity and 
physical resisting power at least, to withstand the abnormal 
strains and other adverse conditions incident to modern in- 
dustrial employment. 

^ 11. Some conditions affecting vocational education. — As 
introductory to discussion of problems of vocational educa- 
tion of women and girls, it is necessary to recognize: (a) 
that the successful pursuit of any and all vocations requires 
that the individual should somewhere and somehow have been 
trained for that pursuit; (b) that under historic conditions 
such training has been the expected by-product (by-educa- 
tion) of actual participation in the earlier and simpler stages 
of the vocation; and (c) that only in recent times and, as 
yet, under exceptional conditions has it been feasible or 
desirable to separate vocational training for proficiency 
from vocational participation for production. 

Furthermore, it must be recognized that the modern de- 



448 Vocational Education 

mand for specialized vocational education (in schools) arises 
from these convictions more or less widely held: (a) that 
for many vocations — homemaking, dressmaking, teaching 

— the conditions and efficacy of apprenticeship have deteri- 
orated greatly in recent years; (b) that for many other 
vocations, especially of modern development — stenography 
and clerical work generally, salesmanship, and scores of 
kinds of factory employments — apprenticeship education 
never has been carried to the point of being more than a 
crude method of trial-and-error selection, accompanied by 
the slow and clumsy building of experience; (c) that the 
absence of systematic provision for vocational education 
works immeasurable harm to individuals, young and old, in 
permanently holding their productive efficiency below the 
requirements for a normal standard of living; and (d) that 
society itself is thereby the loser at all points in the elements 
that make for social wholesomeness and progress. 

It has been previously noted that under American con- 
ditions the great majority of girls and women do and will 
in each case continue to follow two widely unlike vocations 

— a wage-earning vocation from youth to young woman- 
hood, often from sixteen to twenty-four years of age — 
after which they will follow for life the vocation of home- 
making. In some important respects this situation compli- 
cates all problems of vocational education for girls and 
women, although, in the case of commercial and industrial 
vocations, these complications are only slightly more serious 
and difficult than others found in the vocational education 
of boys and men. 

The first difficulty usually encountered is that the girl 
does not take her wage-earning vocation seriously. For her 
it is merely a means to the earning of money. She hopes 
and expects not to follow it long. Except as it brings more 
money she is not greatly interested in promotion. Given 
the opportunity to take vocational training, she seeks to 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 449. 

shorten the period of such training as much as possible. 
She remains indifferent to the cooperative help of unions. 
She develops little of the esprit de corps of work. She is 
easily exploited and the best discipline for dereliction is 
found in a system of fines. 

But the most unsettling difficulty, doubtless, is that her 
second vocation, homemaking, is one toward which condi- 
tions prevent her from moving in anything like a direct way. 
She must wait the will and pleasure of others. It is often 
hardly considered dignified openly to anticipate the new 
career and to prepare for it. As a consequence of the fact 
that the wage-earning girl has been for several years hardly 
more than a boarder in her parents' home or the home of 
others, and has given little serious thought and almost no 
preparation to the work of homemaking, it happens fre- 
quently that she enters upon this work with the naive cheer- 
fulness and ignorance of a child and lets her domestic 
happiness drift upon the rocks of incompetency and discord 
to the great harm of herself and loss to society. 

A third difficulty is encountered as respects those profes- 
sional vocations for which a long term of years is required 
in preparation. Capable and ambitious women graduates 
of high school and even college occasionally manifest keen 
ambitions to become physicians, architects, painters, writers, 
or teachers in college or normal school. As a rule these 
callings require from three to five years of expensive pro- 
fessional training, followed by several years of quasi- 
apprenticeship, during part of which the individual niust be 
supported (at large expense) by her family, and during no 
part of which can she expect to be entirely self-supporting. 
Should girls at eighteen or twenty, who will probably marry 
before they are thirty years of age, be encouraged to enter 
upon the long road of preparation for these professional 
careers, taking the time and using the equipment frequently 
of expensive institutions of training? Would such training 

2G 



45© Vocational Education 

give valuable assets toward homemaking at all in proportion 
to the outlay made upon it? Many differences of even ex- 
pert opinion will be found here. 

The rapid development of production by means of 
machinery and the specialization of processes made possible 
in all highly organized industrial and commercial produc- 
tion have opened endless opportunities for wage-earning 
work to women and especially to girls of average capacity 
and moderate training. Endless varieties of productive 
work are to be found in industrial establishments to-day in 
which all that is required of the girl is that she shall be an 
alert machine-tender. Cloth and clothing manufacture, 
cigarette making, fruit packing, small hardware production, 
bookbinding, jewelry making, printing, telephony, paper-box 
making — these are but suggestive examples. Somewhat 
more skilled are the commercial occupations — clerical and 
salesmanship — which, by virtue of subdivision and special- 
ization, are being rendered, to a substantial extent, increas- 
ingly accessible to half-matured and slightly trained girl 
workers. 

12. Vocational levels. — It is often naively assumed that 
specialized economic production offers, or should offer, 
opportunities for workers generally to rise in their work 
toward places of greater responsibility and reward in the 
same way that was true of the handicraft and other unspe- 
cialized callings. This vague assumption has been respon- 
sible for the tendency to designate so many juvenile callings 
as " blind-alley " or " dead-end " occupations. 

But it is probably much nearer the facts to describe mod- 
ern specialized callings in factory, store, and large office as 
consisting of levels largely, if not wholly, unconnected with 
each other. The work on certain levels is peculiarly suited 
to the powers of young people, and often to persons of quite 
mediocre native abilities. On other levels, maturity and 
perhaps native ability are required, but not necessarily 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 451 

experience on lower levels in the same establishment. Nat- 
urally there are many exceptions to the principle here stated 
in general terms, but in the making of educational programs 
it is not now the exceptions but the prevalent conditions which 
require emphasis, in view of .the deep-seated ignorance of 
many educators now influencing the development of voca- 
tional education. It is clearly to the interest of the worker 
as well as of society that transition from lower to higher 
levels should be rendered as easy and timely as practicable 
for each worker when maturity and ability justify it. That 
is far from being the case at present. Where production 
is highly organized, all the work of one " level " being con- 
fined to one great room or even shop, the best workers of 
this level are retained as long as possible, and every barrier 
is interposed to their movement upward — a situation in 
direct contrast to the " ladder " system of advancement 
inherent in most phases of a complex or handicraft calling, 
such as dressmaking, teaching, farm work, and nursing, 
where increased skill and general competence grow as parts 
of a more or less unified structure. 

Few systematic means have yet been devised toward 
assisting the worker to prepare for the better-paid levels. 
Entry upon these is frequently attended by difficulties of 
the same general character as those encountered in getting 
employment in the first place. Uncertainty, hardship, in- 
itial blundering, the domineering attitudes of foremen and 
forewomen, all make these transitions extraordinarily pain- 
ful and hazardous. Vocational training of the right sort is 
required for young workers in all highly organized indus- 
tries no less in transition from intermediate or lower stages 
to higher stages than at the outset. 

13. Vocational training for specialized vocations. — 
Most of the wage-earning work upon which girls and women 
enter is of a highly subdivided and specialized character, and 
this promises to be increasingly the case. War production 



452 Vocational Education 

has taken almost wholly the direction of enhanced " quantity 
production " of *' standardized goods " — cartridges, uni- 
forms, canned meats, aeroplane wings, shells, rifle sights, 
army shirts, and the like. 

For the sake of the happiness of the worker herself as 
well as for the sake of enhanced production and general 
economic well-being, it is highly desirable that, as prelim- 
inary to entry upon productive work in any specialized 
process, the girl should receive specific and effective voca- 
tional training (and, where necessary or desirable, related 
instruction and social insight) in that process. For many 
specialized processes a few weeks, or, at most, months, may 
amply suffice to give this training, providing there be ded- 
icated to it the same full working day, spirit of concentra- 
tion, and pursuit of specific and definitely conceived ends 
that are characteristic of the vocational pursuit itself. Of 
intensive vocational training of this sort, either for first 
entry upon wage-earning or as a means whereby the worker 
of some experience can be assisted to advance to higher or 
better-paid levels, our public vocational schools provide as 
yet very few examples. Private effort has resulted in some 
suggestive experiments and examples upon which publicly 
supported work may be expected hereafter to be based. It 
requires courage, imagination, and practical insight of kinds 
not common among educators to undertake the promotion 
of intensive, " short-course " vocational training for produc- 
tive specialties, especially when such training obviously in- 
volves large use of " productive work " as an educational 
means, followed by definitely organized " part-time " par- 
ticipation on a wage-earning basis. Some day we shall in 
this connection realize better than we do now the large 
possibilities of the " vestibule school " (a type which should 
not be refused public support solely because the best place 
for its location is in a building chiefly dedicated to industry 
or commerce). 



Probable Economic Future of American Women 453 

14. Homemaking education. — Space does not here per- 
mit extended discussion of the possibilities of vocational 
education for homemaking. Widespread attempts are now 
being made to introduce this vocational education under the 
name " home economics " into upper grades and high 
schools. Where girls have had or can be induced to obtain 
a large ainount of practical experience in their own homes, 
and if the school instruction is definitely correlated with 
such home experience, the net outcome will be a form of 
*' vocational extension education " which may prove to be 
somewhat valuable for farmers' daughters and others not 
leaving the home to work for wages. But for the large 
majority of girls in our industrial and commercial cities, 
home economics education given at the ages from twelve 
to sixteen will probably produce little permanent power of 
" execution " ; but it will, when properly organized, give 
rise to appreciations of a fairly definite sort, useful as foun- 
dations for subsequent training in skill and management. 

But effective homemaking education — for the modal 
American home expecting three to five children, and oper- 
ated without help of servants — can be given only when 
'' motive " is ripe. If girls of from seventeen to twenty 
could look forward to acceptable wage-earning careers as 
household domestics, then the year (or possibly more) just 
before entry upon that calling would be the best time for 
definite, practical education for that form of homemaking 
service. A few girls at sixteen or eighteen years of age — 
only daughters, or daughters with invalid mothers — can 
doubtless be found who will be effectually interested in pre- 
paring to take charge of the domestic work in their own 
homes. These two may be expected, in cities or suburban 
areas, to constitute a sufficient number to justify provision 
of practical training adapted to their needs. 

But as regards the great majority of girls who serve some 
years as wage-earners apart from the home, it is doubtful 



454 Vocational Education 

whether active motives for learning homemaking can be 
counted upon until after several years in the wage-earning 
career have passed, and the young woman has reason to 
anticipate the coming of conditions which will enable her 
to establish a home of her own. The years immediately 
preceding and immediately following marriage are, in the 
last analysis, the best for education in homemaking as a 
vocation. Of course existing social valuations — conven- 
tions, prejudices, fashions — are now opposed to programs 
having such education in view. But social valuations can 
readily be changed when sufficient leaders of ability see the 
light and are willing to spread it. There are many social 
forces now working in America toward the improvement of 
the home and the elevation of the vocation of homemaking. 



I 



CHAPTER XV 

THE PRACTICAL ARTS IN GENERAL EDUCATION^ 

I 

INTRODUCTION 

Manual Training and Household Arts, when first proposed 
as subjects of study and practice for upper grades and high 
schools, were beheved by many to offer the only available 
means of giving in schools what was some years ago vaguely 
conceived as vocational training — '' education through do- 
ing," " tool experience," '' tool sense," " technical knowl- 
edge," as it has been variously called. For many years com- 
mercial courses have been offered in high schools (and some 
commercial studies in the grades) with the avowed intention 
of assisting pupils towards wage-earning callings. Many 
persons still believe that household arts for girls, and agri- 
culture for boys, as these subjects can be presented to pupils 
of ages ranging from twelve to sixteen who are carrying in 
addition regular programs of academic studies, can make 
important contributions towards vocational efficiency. 

But as one result of over a decade of intense interest in 
vocational competency as a distinctive end of one form of 
school education — culminating in the passage of legislation 
providing national aid for industrial, homemaking, and agri- 
cultural vocational education of less than college grade — 
we now see that little of importance for vocational ends can 

1 This chapter, in substantially its present form, was first published in 
the Teachers College Record for January and March of 1918. 

455 



456 Vocational Education 

be accomplished through the manual training, general com- 
mercial courses, gardening and agriculture, and household 
arts as these are found incorporated into customary academic 
curricula. Most students of educational values are now 
forced to the conclusion that vocational education in schools 
can be profitable only when the student, whether at fifteen 
years of age or at twenty, having completed existing re- 
quirements of compulsory school attendance, and having, in 
addition, given so much time to secondary and higher aca- 
demic studies as he desires, is ready for the time being to 
give to the mastery of a vocation substantially as much time 
and concentrated energy as he would give to it if working 
for wages or under conditions of apprenticeship. It is also 
agreed that for the sake of efTectiveness conditions should 
be such that a large proportion — perhaps not less than half 
— of the student's time available for vocational education 
can be given to the actual practice of its processes, even as 
these are carried on in commercially productive shops, offices, 
homes, farms, and salesrooms — and, ideally, so organized 
as to give him a wage or other financial return representing 
compensation for at least a part of his productive effort. 

Having reached the conclusion that the practical arts (to 
use a collective term for all the four chief forms) have little 
bearing on vocational education, it remains for educators to 
analyze more clearly than has heretofore been done their 
educational values for all that non-vocational education 
which we call ** general " or " liberal." That such values are 
to be found in an especially important measure for urban 
children, few educators would now dispute ; but there exists 
as yet no satisfactory analysis of the reasons why we may 
expect to find these values, nor of the probable character of 
the detailed means and methods of instruction by which they 
are to be realized. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 457 

II 

SOCIOLOGICAL AND PEDAGOGICAL BACKGROUNDS 

The Sociological Situation out of which has developed 
modern demands for practical arts education in schools, as 
well as various historical attempts to explain and meet these 
demands, may be summarized as follows : 

1. In primitive societies everywhere, men and women as 
means of self-support, protection, and diversion, develop a 
large number and variety of utilitarian or practical arts, the 
knowledge and skill required in which have been transmitted 
from generation to generation by social imitation in various 
forms. Capturing animals on land, water, and in air ; fight- 
ing hostile peoples ; building defenses against men, animals, 
and weather; preserving foods; working wood, stone, and 
metals; tanning skins; making baskets, textiles, and other 
fabrics ; brewing ; tilling the soil ; carving and otherwise dec- 
orating stone and wood ; domesticating animals ; healing the 
sick; recording and transmitting knowledge; enforcing cus- 
toms ; traveling ; interpreting auguries — these and scores 
of other arts, slowly evolved, become part of the social in- 
heritance. 

Even to-day where conditions of life are simple, we find 
centering in the family group many scores of practical arts. 
On a remote farm, we find : tillage of soil ; training of horses ; 
building of walls, fences, dwellings; preserving foods by 
drying, salting, and canning; baking of bread; cooking of 
meats and vegetables; the making of various articles of 
clothing; digging of wells, drains, and ditches; the making 
of roads; shoeing of horses; burning charcoal; butchering; 
packing of ensilage; making cheese and butter; breeding of 
animals; keeping of books; educating children, etc. Similar 
lists could be made where the environments are those re- 
spectively of the woodsman, fisherman, small shop keeper, 
gypsy, and home craftsman. 



45S Vocational Education 

In these primitive homes, ancient or contemporary, the 
children early become participants in the economic processes. 
On the average small farm children from five years of age 
onward are in a measure producers of useful service. They 
guard animals, run errands, help to ''clean up," weed gar- 
dens, fetch water and wood, and in many other ways con- 
tribute to the economic maintenance of the home and farm 
establishment. In part, this service is rendered in response 
to instinctive desires to imitate the activities of elder work- 
ers; in part, to win the grateful approval of the older per- 
sons assisted ; in part, more or less unwillingly, as tasks im- 
posed and uncompensated; and occasionally, for money or 
other material reward. 

This participation during childhood and youth in the 
practical arts activities of the home, shop, farm, fishing 
boat, and other simple economic agencies was doubtless 
universal until quite recently ; and is still practicable in some 
degree for perhaps ninety per cent of all girls, and over fifty 
per cent of all boys in the United States. But it is clear 
to every observer that opportunities for it are everywhere 
diminishing. The suburban home gives to the boys of six 
to sixteen years of age only rare and meager opportunities to 
share in productive work of any sort; and practically none 
at all to work with older youths or men, especially those like 
father, brothers, and '' hired help " who would be sympa- 
thetic and cooperative. In the case of girls, the suburban 
home still affords some opportunities for helpfulness, where 
most of the service is not delegated to servants; but even 
there, we find that many of the practical arts have been spe- 
cialized away from the home. Baking, laundering, dress- 
making, and gardening survive in urban communities only in 
vestigial forms. 

On more progressive farms, boys are given less to do 
and assist their elders less frequently than formerly. 
" Boys " cannot be trusted to drive good horses, milk good 



The Practical Arts in General Education 459 

cows, manipulate costly and perhaps dangerous machinery, 
construct well-finished fences, drains, and wells, convey to 
market carefully packed products, repair well-kept harness, 
or otherwise share in the elaborated and technical processes 
characteristic of good modern farming. SpeciaHzed work, 
soon becoming drudgery, there is, of course, in abundance; 
but the art, skill, talent, and even inventive genius involved 
in its organization and mechanisms are commonly special- 
ized far away from the ken of the boy. Such work, too, 
takes little hold on imitative instincts, and does not round 
into particular projects or achievements which make so de- 
cided an appeal to growing youth. 

Because the home, the working environment of the grow- 
ing girl, is usually less developed and specialized than the 
industrial, agricultural, commercial, and professional fields 
in which men and boys work, girls both in city and in rural 
homes still become participants in many of the practical 
arts. When it is remembered that servants are found in 
perhaps fewer than ten per cent of the homes of America; 
that the average family money income in perhaps ninety 
per cent of these homes is under $1,500 per year; and that 
the functions of the wife and mother must always involve 
a large amount of preparation of food, repair of clothing, 
nursing of children, cleaning of floors, dishes, and garments, 
making of beds, and caring for the sick, it is evident that, 
outside of school hours, the large majority of American 
girls still live in an atmosphere of productive work, where 
participation is natural, easily effected on a " short unit " 
basis, and open to all the incentives of attraction and compul- 
sion normally required for the gradual induction of young 
people into the useful activities of the world. 

2. Withdrawal of Practical Arts from Homes. — So long 
as social evolution continues in directions now established, 
children will share less and less in the economic activities 
of their parents. Several contributing causes for this are 



460 Vocational Education 

found. The first is that economic activities, except as re- 
gards homemaking, simple farming, primitive fishing, and 
very small merchandising, are now no longer carried on in 
the immediate home environment. In the professions, rail- 
roading, large merchandising, and other forms of business, 
almost all forms of manufacturing, and in well-developed 
agriculture and fisheries, it is customary for the chief work- 
ers in the family other than the homemaker to ** go to 
work " at early hours, and often for periods of several days. 
From the standpoint of the growing children, this *' going 
to work " of their elders means transition to remote places 
and behind forbidding walls whither childish imaginations 
can hardly follow, and whence, of course, come no incen- 
tives for childish participation in the work of the "big 
people." 

But this centralization of productive industry has its 
causes in the fact that, in a sense, the ''practical arts" have 
ceased to be, having been replaced by those systematized 
forms of production which constitute modern "business," 
"manufacture," "transportation," "professional enter- 
prise," etc. In all these fields, we are in the presence of ap- 
plied science, use of natural forces, organized and specialized 
effort and employment of fixed and mobile capital in pro- 
portions that are large in comparison with the labor involved. 
We can hardly doubt that the processes which have made it 
possible for modern industry, by means of harnessed forces 
and organization, to multiply the productiveness of a unit 
of human effort and thus make it possible for constantly 
larger populations with rising standards of living to live on 
given areas, will continue. We may reasonably expect the 
small "mixed" farm, the little workshop attached to the 
home, the primitive fishing equipment, and merchandising 
establishment "in front" or "below" the residence, to dis- 
appear, and with them the educational advantages which 
childish participation as co-workers in these centers of labor 
afforded. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 461 

3. Practical Arts for Development Have these educa- 
tional advantages been important ? It is this inquiry which 
gives significance to past and present attempts to estabhsh 
"practical arts" as courses in schools. Perhaps the best 
analogy for the problem here suggested will be found in the 
evolution of educational opinion regarding the place of 
physical play in development. The natural disposition to- 
wards physical play, so instinctive during childhood, has 
usually found abundant opportunities for space, implement, 
and social incentive in the simple and staple environment of 
our ancestors. Little importance was customarily attached 
to physical play — it was often regarded as one of the nat- 
ural '' weeds" of life, to be disposed of as soon as occasion 
and means of enforcing the serious thought and work of life 
could be provided. 

But the growth of urban environments, the migration of 
peoples, and, at one stage, the premature forcing of children 
into routine labor, by impairing opportunities for physical 
play, revealed its importance and necessity in the develop- 
ment of the child. To-day the best opinion generally holds 
that abundant physical play during the plastic years of in- 
fancy, childhood, and youth is desirable for all forms of 
growth, and indispensable to the best and highest forms of 
that growth — physical, moral, aesthetic, intellectual. The 
biological reasons for this are, to a large extent, obscure, but 
the biological situation involved is not. Whatever the orig- 
inal causes, nature has undoubtedly provided that an impor- 
tant part of the child's physical (and mental and social) de- 
velopment is to be achieved through the activities constitut- 
ing play. Withholding opportunities and incentives for such 
play probably always results in a dwarfing of the child's 
development. Consequently, when circumstances of re- 
stricted material environment or isolation operate to pre- 
vent play activities, society, represented by the city, the 
village, the church, the family, and other groupings is now 



462 Vocational Education 

seeking purposefully to provide favorable play facilities and 
incentives. Hence the modern play movement, regarded by 
social economists as one of the most important means of off- 
setting the deteriorating effects of highly artificial environ- 
ments wherein children must be reared. 

Now it is inherently probable that if we possessed ade- 
quate knowledge of child development, of the physical, 
psychical, and social processes by which the plastic infant 
becomes the matured man or woman, we should find that 
early participation in practical arts activities constitutes, like 
physical play, as narrowly defined, also a highly desirable 
means to normal development and, perhaps, an indispensable 
means to the highest forms of that development. We should 
expect this to be so because of the many thousands of years 
of man's evolution during which children early began partici- 
pation in the economic activities which always claimed so 
large a part of the attention of the adult members of the 
family group. For countless centuries, so far as we know, 
children matured in economic power through the appren- 
ticeship of the family group — through that instinctive 
early sharing in useful work which at first closely allied it- 
self to the play life, and only imperceptibly passed under the 
yoke of sustained purpose and rigidly held routine. 

Probably then, all forms of childish participation in the 
practical arts of the simple home, workshop, trading place, 
farm, mine, and fishing station have been important, even 
indispensable elements in the making of men and women. 
If so, when conditions arise that shut children away from 
opportunities for such participation, society will find it neces- 
sary by some means to supply the missing opportunities for 
growth or development. 

4. Practical Arts Courses in some form have been grad- 
ually finding a place in schools for upwards of a hundred 
years. Schools for orphans and delinquents, attempting to 
supply all the developmental means of the home, carried 



The Practical Arts in General Education 463 

over needlework, choring, gardening, and other useful work. 
In some countries, training in needlework for girls was long 
ago delegated to the schools as naturally as training in pen- 
manship. The demands voiced by Pestalozzi and his fol- 
lowers for " object teaching," while only remotely related to 
practical arts, did represent a tendency in educational 
thought towards greater concreteness and less bookishness 
in school work. 

Wherever sympathetic educators have brought city boys 
or girls — or others deprived of opportunities for partici- 
pation in home work — into shops equipped with tools (in- 
cluding those appropriate to the household arts), they have 
almost instantly perceived in the avidity with which these 
young people entered upon constructive activities, manifes- 
tations of needs for expression of workmanship instincts 
that are deep-seated, and that probably have a close relation- 
ship to all forms of fundamental development — moral and 
mental no less than physical, social and cultural no less than 
vocational. 

For a number of reasons, the evolution of practical arts 
as school subjects has taken place most rapidly in cities. 
Progressive movements in education usually start in cities, 
philanthropy frequently leading the way. Educational re- 
sources wherewith to procure equipment are commonly 
found most readily in prosperous and generous centers of 
population. Urban segregation of peoples along economic 
and other lines brings into relief in masses those most in 
need of specialized or extended educational treatment. In 
the case of practical arts the deprivations of an artificial en- 
vironment are first clearly seen in cities. Furthermore, in 
cities where industries gather, appear greatest needs for 
vocational education, which, in the estimation (probably 
mistaken) of many people heretofore, could best be met 
through practical arts instruction. 

It has been natural, therefore, that in the processes of ex- 



464 Vocational Education 

tending and enriching school education during the last half 
century, we should have seen many and varied attempts to 
incorporate practical arts in some form adapted to children 
into school curricula all the way from the kindergarten to 
the senior year of the high school. 

5. Historic Experiments. — We need not here recount the 
history of constructive work or handwork in the kinder- 
garten and lower grades ; of manual training or sloyd for up- 
per grade boys; of "mechanic arts" in special high schools 
for boys; of sewing and cooking for girls of upper grades, 
or "home economics" for those in high schools; or of 
gardening or agriculture in rural or village schools. All of 
these have been interesting and suggestive developments, 
and each has contributed something to our present stock of 
educational ideas. 

But it is necessary here to review the aims which seem 
to have controlled the introduction and development of these 
practical activities, even where now we perceive that these 
aims were grounded in a very mystical and uncertain peda- 
gogy, since, in large measure, we have yet to discover satis- 
factory foundations, demonstrable or hypothetical, for 
practical arts teaching. 

Certainly we can regard with much respect the objectives 
long held, more or less clearly, on behalf of practical activ- 
ities in classes for younger children — namely, to give op- 
portunities for expression, to give concreteness and realism 
to school work, and, more recently, to provide vital centers 
of correlation for the more abstract school subjects. But 
we now see that, however sound the vague pedagogical the- 
ories here involved, commonly the very fragmentary and 
often very formal exercises in handwork developed consti- 
tuted at best a frail basis for the activities and correlations 
desired; nor has subsequent experience improved the situ- 
ation greatly except in work for children under ten years of 
age. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 465 

The Disciplinary Theory. — More open to criticism has 
been the " disciphnary " theory which even yet controls heav- 
ily — without now being admitted as such — in manual 
training for upper grades and high schools. The very words 
'' manual training" reflect the prominence of this theory, the 
implications being that through some definite exercises with 
tools the " hand " can be trained for a large variety of the 
useful works of life. Of course, the " hand " can be trained, 
and in hundreds of ways — to write with a pen, to pitch a 
baseball curve, to handle a dentist's forceps, to discern by 
touch the quality of cloth, to thread a needle, to button a 
jacket, to turn a screwdriver, to drive a hammer, to deliver 
the blow of the pugilist, to roll a cigarette, to play the violin, 
or to manipulate the typewriter. But we now see that each 
of these forms of skill is specific and individual, and probably 
almost wholly unrelated to any other. We can certainly 
train the hand — but only by deciding first for what particu- 
lar form of skill or power we wish to train it, and then mov- 
ing directly towards that. We should like to believe that 
much training in tying knots or whittling will lay founda- 
tions for other forms of manual skill to be acquired later. 
If the girl with hand trained for rapid action on piano keys 
could learn typewriting with greater facility than her sister 
who has had no piano practice, we could find ways for re- 
ducing the time and effort required to learn many vocational 
arts ; but there is no evidence that we can thus utilize some 
of the effects of one '' skill " in other and, what seem to be 
only when superficially considered, related fields. 

We are forced thus to the conviction that there is little 
foundation for what is commonly held as the " disciplinary " 
theory in education — that some specific forms of training 
in mental or physical skill or in moral habit will '' transfer " 
or "spread," and thus give foundations for powers to be 
employed later. We shall have to relegate this theory to the 
limbo wherein are to be found shelved the " panaceas " or 

2H 



466 Vocational Education 

curative " simples," the " philosophers' stones," the " foun- 
tains of youth," the philosophers' ultimate formulae and 
primordial substances, and all the other more or less mystical 
or magic simples wherewith humanity, aspiring towards 
the light, has tried to project its understanding beyond the 
bounds of tested experience. 

Probably laymen more than educators have imputed to 
practical arts in the schools significant values for vocational 
education, although at times educators have not been slow 
to take advantage of public credulity in this respect to ob- 
tain additional funds for school work. Indeed, under the 
influence of the disciplinary theory referred to above, it has 
always, of course, been easily possible to infer that any value 
arising from handwork could and would function in voca- 
tional competency. 

The situation here involved is by no means simple, partly 
because in certain fields of productive work like the home 
and the small farm, the activities there carried on are still 
often primitive and in reality practical arts, and capable, 
therefore, of being in a measure related to the practical arts 
possible in the schools. On the other hand, in the fields of 
professional, industrial, nautical, commercial, and mihtary 
activities, where specialization has gone far, and the simple 
character of the primitive practical arts has almost com- 
pletely disappeared, it is doubtful if any important intimate 
connections have ever been established between the practi- 
cal arts work that has been done by pupils under sixteen 
years of age and the vocational pursuits carried on in the 
world of productive work. But it has been easy for parents 
and others interested in vocational training to be deluded 
by the practical appearance of the shops and laboratories 
devoted to practical arts work. In some cases, notably in 
bookkeeping and typewriting, where social striving for more 
attractive fields of employment made it practically certain 
that most of the pupils electing these subjects would eventu- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 467 

ally go into commercial occupations, whether their school 
training were good or bad as vocational preparation, even 
the pupils themselves have, after completing their work, 
continued to be deceived by its specious resemblance to real 
vocational education. 

The final evolution in a number of states of a definite de- 
mand for special public schools that shall offer genuine vo- 
cational education (culminating in the Smith-Hughes act 
extending national aid for the support of such education) 
has tended to clear up the previously confused situation as 
regards the relation of practical arts to vocational education. 
It is now recognized by careful thinkers among educators 
that manual training in its various varieties can contribute 
practically nothing to vocational competency; that however 
valuable the general household arts work may be for general 
education, it contributes but little of substance to direct 
preparation for homemaking; that textbook and laboratory 
courses in agriculture are remote from the vocational effi- 
ciency demanded for farming, while home gardening may 
have only slightly greater significance; and that the com- 
mercial courses of our schools are now not quite fish and 
not quite fowl, and will have to be so divided that definite 
vocational training can be provided for those who have al- 
ready elected a vocation while for others the bookkeeping, 
typewriting, etc., can be made to function as elements in 
general education. 

Vocational Guidance. — Finally are to be noted the wide- 
spread attempts during the last two or three years to justify 
several forms of practical arts instruction on grounds of 
their contributions to vocation finding or guidance. We 
must recognize the importance of providing at as early a 
stage as practicable for such experiences as will enable 
youths to ascertain, both negatively and positively, their 
probable vocational powers and interests. If by some form 
of practical arts teaching such guidance could in substantial 



468 Vocational Education 

measure be given, we might well afford to sacrifice to this 
end some other objectives possible to these subjects. 

But the present writer is of the opinion that such guid- 
ance, through practical arts, is only feasible in slight meas- 
ure and can be effective with only a small proportion of 
youths twelve to sixteen years of age. The chief difficulty 
is that of representing in any school shop the realities of 
commercial production — its demands for commercially val- 
uable qualities and quantities of work, and for the social 
atmosphere of work. At best the school devoted to general 
education can introduce within its walls only quite amateur- 
ish and often very unreal elements of vocational life — as 
witness the cabinet-making, the gardening, the bookkeeping, 
and the cooking and sewing of junior and senior high 
schools. 

No less serious an obstacle is the difficulty of actually rep- 
resenting in any school the numerous special lines of pro- 
ductive work found in any industrial or commercial com- 
munity. If we note the long list of local occupations re- 
ported by the United States Census for such a commercial 
city as Rochester, New York, we can readily infer the im- 
practicability of giving all, or any important proportion of 
them, representative treatment in school shops. ^ 

1 Males and females in selected wage-earning occupations in Roch- 
ester, N. Y. : 

(Males) Fruit growers and nurserymen; garden laborers, gardeners, 
orchard and nursery laborers; apprentices (in manufacturing and me- 
chanical industries); bakers; blacksmiths; brick and stone masons; 
buffers and polishers (metal); builders and building contractors; cab- 
inet makers ; carpenters ; compositors, linotypers, and typesetters ; elec- 
tricians and electrical engineers; engineers (stationary); firemen 
(except locomotive and fire department) ; foremen and overseers (man- 
ufacturing) ; laborers (in mechanical and manufacturing industries) ; 
helpers in building and hand trades ; lithographers ; machinists and mill- 
wrights ; managers and superintendents (manufacturing) ; manufac- 
turers and officials; molders, founders, and casters (iron); painters, 
glaziers, and varnishers (building) ; painters, glaziers, and varnishers 
(factory); plumbers and gas and steam fitters; semi-skilled operatives 
in furniture, piano, and organ factories ; semi-skilled operatives in 
printing and publishing ; semi-skilled operatives in shoe factories ; semi- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 469 

It will be contended that while most commercial produc- 
tion is greatly specialized, a few type materials, machines, 
and even processes, can be selected which will serve to inter- 
pret them all. This is an attractive theory and deserves 
careful testing against the facts of experience. It seems 
to savor somewhat of the mysticisms behind which the edu- 
cator, as did once the physician, still conceals his ignorance 
of realities. 

Doubtless, through any well-devised and very flexible plan 
of practical arts instruction, a small number of pupils will 
discover positive and negative interests — attractions and 
repulsions — which will have some bearing on the vocation 
finally selected. Perhaps five per cent of the boys sampling 
wood-working, electrical working, printing, gardening, and 
house repair will find among these their vocations — while 
another five per cent will find that for these lines of work 
they distinctly do not have ability or liking. Such contri- 

skilled operatives in suit, coat, cloak, and overall factories ; sewers and 
sewing machine operators ; shoemakers and cobblers ; tailors ; tinsmiths ; 
chauffeurs; conductors (street railroad); draymen, teamsters, and ex- 
pressmen ; laborers (road and street building and repairing) ; laborers 
(steam railroad); locomotive engineers; motormen ; clerks in stores; 
commercial travelers ; deliverymen ; insurance agents and officials ; 
laborers, porters, and helpers in stores ; real estate agents and officials ; 
retail dealers; salesmen (stores) ; firemen; guards, watchmen, and door- 
keepers; laborers (public service); policemen; clergymen; draftsmen; 
lawyers, judges, and justices; musicians and teachers of music; physi- 
cians and surgeons; barbers, hairdressers, and manicurists ;_ bartenders; 
janitors and sextons; porters; saloon keepers; servants; waiters; agents 
and canvassers; bookkeepers, cashiers, and accountants; clerks; collec- 
tors ; messenger, bundle, and office boys. 

(Females) Dressmakers and seamstresses; forewomen and overseers 
(manufacturing) ; milliners and millinery dealers ; semi-skilled opera- 
tives in button factories; semi-skilled operatives in printing and pub- 
lishing; semi-skilled operatives in shoe factories; sewers and sewing 
machine operators (factory) ; tailoresses; telephone operators; clerks in 
stores; retail dealers; saleswomen (stores) ; musicians and teachers of 
music; teachers (school) ; trained nurses; boarding and lodging house- 
keepers ; housekeepers and stewardesses ; laundresses (not in laundry) ; 
laundry operatives ; midwives and nurses (not trained) ; servants ; wait- 
resses; bookkeepers, cashiers, and accountants; clerks; stenographers 
and typewriters. 



470 Vocational Education 

butions to vocation finding will be acceptable when inciden- 
tal to the pursuit of more general and substantial objectives, 
but, surely, they would in themselves constitute no justifica- 
tion for giving practical arts subjects a prominent place 
in school curricula. 

6. Summary. — It would seem, then, that we have, as a re- 
sult of nearly a century's interest in practical arts instruc- 
tion in schools (to say nothing of the pioneering efforts of 
innovators like Comenius, Pestalozzi, and others) reached 
the following conclusions : 

(a) For children otherwise deprived of "natural" op- 
portunities for early and gradual induction into productive 
activities, the need is great that schools shall provide such 
opportunities as part of their offerings towards general 
development, general training, and general instruction. 

(b) But it is now rarely practicable, even if it were im- 
portant, to secure vocational competency through the means 
and methods of practical arts participation, because of 
changes in most fields of economic production. 

(c) Neither is it practicable to hold as primary objectives 
of practical arts education such ends as self-expression, hand 
training, vocation finding, or provision of centers of corre- 
lation for instruction in other types of subject matter, ex- 
cept, possibly, in the lowest grades. 

(d) The final justification for the provision of abun- 
dant opportunities for practical arts participation in schools 
is to be found in the contributions such amateur participa- 
tion makes to general development, in ways analogous to 
the contributions of physical play. 

7. But if general development, especially for youths 
from twelve to sixteen years of age, be held as the primary 
objective of practical arts education, then fundamental re- 
visions of currently accepted traditions as to means and 
methods are essential. As preliminary to a discussion of 
these, agreement should be had as to use of terms. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 471 

III 

PROPOSED DEFINITIONS AND DISTINCTIONS 

As a basis for constructive work in proposing educational 
policies, and in evolving practicable administrative plans, the 
following are suggested as useful definitions and distinc- 
tions in the effort to determine desirable and feasible ob- 
jectives for practical arts education in schools : 

1. All kinds of instruction, training, and fostered devel- 
opment, provided through schools, may be classified as {a) 
general (common, liberal, or non-vocational) education and 
{h) vocational education. 

2. Vocational education includes only those educational 
objectives that are determined by the requirements of spe- 
cific vocations; and, because the vocational activities of men 
are greatly differentiated, these requirements are distinctive 
according to the specific vocation for which preparation is 
being made. As a corollary, there can be no '' general " vo- 
cational education. 

3. General education includes all objectives determined 
by the requirements of common citizenship, common culture, 
and general development of important powers and capacities 
in selected individuals, irrespective of future occupation. 

4. In the case of each body of *' subject matter " of in- 
struction, type of training, or species of fostered develop- 
ment of inherent powers and capacities, it is obvious that 
effective practice requires that there should at all times be 
a "primary" or controlling objective, towards which all 
other possible objectives must be regarded as secondary or 
incidental and, therefore, as not controlling of means and 
methods of education. It follows that means and practices 
in schools designed to function as general education cannot 
be expected to yield more than incidental value to the proper 
ends of vocational education; and vice versa. 



472 Vocational Education 

5. It is clearly possible to teach in schools an almost end- 
less variety of practical processes and technical knowledge 
as these are characteristic of the economically productive oc- 
cupations (productive of first-hand or exchangeable eco- 
nomic utilities ) in which men and women engage or have in 
the past engaged. But such teaching may have, in any given 
case, as its controlling objective, to prepare the youth for 
effective participation in a vocational sense in the occupa- 
tion upon which the specific teaching is based; or, quite 
otherwise, the objective may be simply to provide for the 
acquisition of general experience, for participation in whole- 
some activity of a non-vocational (possibly amateur) char- 
acter, and for the development of interests, appreciations, 
and tastes as are stimulated by such activity. The first is 
properly a vocational objective; the second, no less certainly, 
a general or liberal objective. There is no satisfactory 
evidence that, except in the case of rare individuals, both 
can be ministered to by the same form of school practice, 
method, or spirit of work. 

6. Hence the proposal that all use in schools of practical 
activities and immediately related knowledge based upon 
the occupations of men shall, when directed towards produc- 
ing specific vocational competency, be designated as voca- 
tional education; and when used as elements or phases of 
general education, as practical arts. 

7. The proposals and recommendations made in this pa- 
per are based upon the following hypotheses as to desirable 
and profitable educational aims : 

a. The objectives or purposes of all education^ fall 
roughly into two classes according as the controlling purpose 

1 The word " education " is here used to include all forms of develop- 
ment, instruction, and training for which conscious provision is or can be 
made by society. It includes the direct education of the schools, and 
also the by-education of shop, home, church, press, police power, street 
and playground, etc., in so far as these naturally provide or can be 
designed to provide examples for imitation, suggestions, openings, op- 
portunities, and incentives for developmental play, and other activities. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 473 

in any case is : (a) the facilitating and furthering of the nor- 
mal development of the child along lines largely natural, 
instinctive, spontaneous (herein called beta types of learn- 
ing), or (&) so training and instructing the child that he 
shall possess later, and especially in manhood, certain spe- 
cific powers and capacities deemed of importance in civilized 
Hfe (herein called alpha types of learning). 

( 1 ) Illustrations. Under the first head we should place : 
all ordinary physical play and those games to which children 
readily take on basis of imitation; all ordinary powers of 
running, walking, climbing, creeping, swimming (when 
learned young), conversing in the vernacular, singing, danc- 
ing, sharing in everyday occupations; the acquisition of 
knowledge from story, natural contact with environment, 
naive experimentation, childish participation in vocations; 
all eager participation in physical, social, or intellectual activ- 
ities when once systematic training has removed mechanical 
difiiculties, as fiction reading, social dancing, card playing, 
travel, theater attendance, tennis, letter writing (for a few), 
amateur gardening, musical execution, craftsmanship, and 
the acquisition of a vocation by '' picking it up." 

(2) Under the second head we would include all those 
forms of direct and positive education having as ends : to 
read, write, and spell in the vernacular; to read or speak a 
foreign language (as involving others than children under 
five) ; to read musical notation; to play an instrument; to 
meet well the requirements of a vocation; to know with some 
degree of accuracy as well as ability to recall and use, the 
facts and relations presented in specified areas of history, 
science, geography; to be able to execute with some degree 
of precision work in drawing, writing, calculation, construc- 
tion, and other fields in which, qualitatively or quantita- 
tively, the powers sought represent the exactions of civil- 
ization upon the " natural " man. 

h. In the early stages of their evolution, it has not been 



474 Vocational Education 

the function of the schools, as speciahzed agencies of educa- 
tion, to provide for the ''beta " types of learning described 
above. It was expected that, in the limited time and with 
the limited means at their disposal, the schools should devote 
their efforts exclusively to the alpha types, thus leaving to 
the home and other non-school agencies responsibility for 
providing the opportunities for development described above 
as beta types of learning. 

c. Under modern conditions, and more particularly in 
urban or other communities where non-school facilities for 
natural or ''beta" types of learning are deficient or other- 
wise ineffective, society progressively delegates to the school 
responsibility for promoting these types. In large measure, 
this explains : the use of the kindergarten, especially in 
cities; promotion under the auspices of the school of play- 
grounds, games, athletics, and physical play generally; the 
development in schools of libraries, story telHng, musical 
and art exhibitions, and other means of promoting natural 
satisfaction of intellectual interests; and the promotion of 
the social {i.e. sociabiHty) sides of school life. 

d. Any education designed directly and purposefully to 
fit for vocation clearly belongs in the alpha category. It is 
doubtful if any serious attempt to provide in schools for 
vocational by-education would be profitable, although doubt- 
less some important by-education towards vocation results 
from the purposive pursuit of educational ends properly 
to be described as cultural and social (or, together, lib- 
eral). 

e. On the other hand, it is highly probable that, for all 
young persons and especially during the transitional years 
from the age of twelve to sixteen, or even eighteen, a large 
amount of participation in practical activities related to and 
suggested by the vocational activities of men and women 
will make contributions to development — physical, social, 
cultural, perhaps, remotely, vocational — analogous in im- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 475 

portance and general character to those made by physical 
play. But contributions to education through such partici- 
pation in practical activities clearly belong to the beta 
class of educational ends, given above. If provided for in, 
or under the auspices of, schools, it is doubtful if they should 
ever be required to partake of the specific and determinate 
character of the alpha type of learning, especially since final 
results are to be found simply in the general development of 
the individual and not in specific powers and capacities re- 
quired in civilized society. In so far as specific forms of 
manual skill are required in vocations — except handwrit- 
ing — these must be acquired through direct vocational edu- 
cation. 

/. As in the case of kindergarten activities, provision for 
play under the direction of the school, nature study, story- 
telling, chorus singing, library reading, and other forms of 
beta education, it becomes the duty of society (to itself as 
well as to its individual members) in any given locality or 
situation to provide for practical arts participation only 
when either {a) the non-school agencies become less able 
than formerly to provide for it; or (&) because of changed 
conditions, there arises a greater need than existed formerly 
for this form of assisted development. If we assume the 
normal social environment under which boys and girls have 
been reared for thousands of years, usually to have included 
abundant opportunity for early participation as little helpers, 
assistants, amateur workers in the easier phases of the voca- 
tional activities of their elders, then it may easily follow 
that, under modern economic conditions, the need that prac- 
tical arts be developed in or through schools arises for the 
reasons given under {a) above. 

g. It can readily be shown that opportunities are denied 
the children of many communities to-day to participate in 
the easier stages of the vocational activities of their elders. 
Probably the desirable development of these children can be 



47^ Vocational Education 

effected only by the provision through the schools of oppor- 
tunities for the participation in practical arts activities which 
their environment denies them. 

h. For convenience we may classify practical arts sub- 
jects suited to schools and especially for youths from twelve 
to sixteen as follows : 

( 1 ) Agricultural arts : home gardening ; tree planting 
and nursing; poultry raising; food packing; ''corn club" 
work; pig clubs; milking; butter and cheese making; fruit 
drying; farm product marketing; farm mechanics; etc. 

(2) Industrial arts: cloth weaving; house repair and 
building; house painting; installation of screens, drainage, 
water supply, electric bells, electric lighting, central heating ; 
machine dissection and reassembly (sewing machines, guns, 
lawn mowers, stoves, pumps, bicycles, motors, optical instru- 
ments, vacuum cleaners, washing machines, lathes, etc.) ; 
bookbinding; printing; photography; wall papering and dec- 
oration; fabrication of playground apparatus; furniture 
making; tool sharpening; wall building; road construction; 
boat building; photo-mounting; engraving; mechanical 
draughting; pottery and glass making; shoe repairing; tail- 
oring and clothing repair; tinsmithing; mining; jewelry 
making; cigar making; teaming; bread baking; food pack- 
ing; and scores of other activities based upon building, man- 
ufacturing, mining, and transporting industries ; etc. 

(3) Commercial arts: typewriting; business penman- 
ship, arithmetic, documents, English; display advertising; 
selling; bookkeeping; package making; comptometer manip- 
ulation; filing; banking; telegraphy; dictaphone operation; 
etc. 

(4) Household arts: kitchen cooking; camp cooking; 
food preserving; food buying; food serving; house plan- 
ning; toy house construction; home (or room) decoration; 
furniture choosing, distributing, upkeep; bed-making; re- 
pair (or upkeep) of apparatus for plumbing, heating, light- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 477 

ing, cleaning, ventilating, screening, cooking, sewing; in- 
fant nursing (feeding, cleaning, dressing, exercising); sick 
nursing; decorative window and yard gardening; clothing 
buying, making, repairing; accounting; entertaining; par- 
ticipation in festivals; and many others. 

(5) Nautical arts: fishing; fish planting; boat making; 
boat sailing; etc. (a division not yet found in American 
schools). 

IV 

PROPOSALS FOR INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

The Comprehensive Shop The following proposed shop 

for boys from twelve to fourteen years of age with a tenta- 
tive program of activities is here described in order to give 
a measure of concrete exemplification to the pedagogical 
findings set forth in the present paper. 

Let us assume a city junior high school of 1200 pupils, 
chiefly from twelve to fourteen years of age, which offers 
to boys three elective courses in practical arts : namely, the 
'' agricultural," the " commercial," and the " industrial." In 
each of these courses, the amount of time to be given by 
pupils enrolled will vary from two to ten hours per week, 
administrative economy requiring that a pupil shall enroll 
for some definite number of weekly periods. Assume fur- 
ther that experience shows that an average of 300 boys will 
enroll in the department of industrial arts and that the 
average weekly attendance will be fiwo. hours per pupil. 

Let us in addition suppose that for the principal hous- 
ing of the industrial arts department there is provided 
one large shop room about sixty feet square, with a mezza- 
nine floor, the whole providing about 5000 feet of floor 
space. This room is to be lighted, heated, and ventilated in 
accordance with approved principles of factory construc- 
tion. 



478 Vocational Education 

The industries (excluding commerce, agriculture, and 
homemaking) of the day, and especially those of the region 
from which the pupils are drawn, are canvassed for activ- 
ities which will probably appeal to the amateur practical in- 
stincts and ideals of boys from twelve to fourteen, and 
through which they can realize products that will possess 
some vital significance to them as results of amateur effort. 
At least one set of the necessary tools or machines will, in 
each case, be installed. If the character of the work or the 
implements in any case (such as photography, forge work, 
gluing, etc.) requires a measure of seclusion or protection, 
small areas of the large shop might be glassed, in for this 
purpose. 

In the light of experience or our knowledge of inherent 
probabilities, we may assume that equipment for the follow- 
ing purposes would find a place : wood-working tools such 
as hand and power tools suitable to the making of simple 
articles of home and school furniture (book-cases, tables, 
chairs, etc.), playground apparatus, etc.; power and hand 
sharpeners for knives and other home cutlery, chisels, saws, 
axes, hoes, etc. ; printing press, type, etc. ; forge, anvil, and 
other equipment necessary for making hoes, picks, hinges, 
and various repair parts; cameras, dark room, etc., for ama- 
teur photography; appliances for half-soling and patching 
shoes; tools and materials for vulcanizing and repairing 
bicycle tires, tubes, and garden hose; sewing machines and 
other materials for tailoring and pressing; kit for simple 
plumbing repair work at home or in school; equipment for 
installing signal bells and practice instruments for teleg- 
raphy, telephony, and wireless; equipment for home and 
school painting, varnishing, and glazing; tools for book- 
binding; apphances for tinsmithing repair, and minor sheet 
metal construction; equipment for the execution of small 
construction jobs in concrete; tools for work with decorative 
metals; and many others. Probably examination of indus- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 479 

tries not represented above, e.g. mining, textile manufac- 
ture, pottery and glass making, food packing, paving, trans- 
portation, engine driving and repair, leather working, and 
the hke will reveal many other possible projects meeting 
the dual requirement of giving a serviceable product, and 
of being suitable as regards magnitude, safety, and costs 
for boys, from twelve to fourteen years of age. 

As a rule, sufficient equipment for only one worker at a 
time in one field or department would probably be supplied, 
except in the case, perhaps, of certain frequently used hand 
tools. 

Project Basis Obviously, the industrial arts work would 

have to be organized on a " project " basis; that is, a pupil or 
a group of cooperating pupils would be given opportunities 
to elect definite units of constructive work, each of these 
having an integral character, each suggesting or demanding 
appropriate standards of execution, and each leading to a 
serviceable or enjoyable product. But there should be 
placed before the learner much more than some meager di- 
rections for his project. Ideally, he should have access to 
several examples of previously executed work on any type 
of project — executed by former pupils, the teacher, or even 
procured from commercial channels. To these concrete 
examples should be added an abundance of printed and illus- 
trated descriptive matter, not merely of projects adapted to 
youthful capacity, but also of those gigantic projects through 
which man by his enterprise is changing not only the con- 
ditions of human living but the very face of the earth 
itself. 

Under these conditions, our large open work shop would 
naturally be divided into various small sections, some of them 
inclosed, and in each of which would be gathered suitable 
concrete examples of work done, together with printed 
matter, pictures, etc. A substantial part of the educational 
value of such a shop would be realized simply through the 



480 Vocational Education 

opportunities afforded to all pupils to observe tools in use, 
projects in various stages of completion, pictures of related 
commercial projects, etc. 

It is not here assumed that all the boys of the junior high 
school would come, or would be admitted, to this industrial 
arts shop. Attendance should certainly be optional, and no 
one should be permitted to enter or to remain unless pre- 
pared to take the work in a serious amateur spirit and to 
conform to the necessary disciplinary requirements of the 
place — which, of course, will be very different from those 
of a schoolroom, and will probably more nearly resemble 
those of a well-conducted shop, except that under reasonable 
restrictions full opportunities should be given to any pupil 
to observe processes other than those in which he is himself 
engaged. 

It is apparent, too, that no serial arrangement of projects 
is necessary or desirable. Naturally, the approval of the 
instructor would be required before a pupil could undertake 
a given project; and that approval would be withheld if the 
pupil lacked the strength, skill, or knowledge probably re- 
quired to execute it in accordance with reasonable amateur 
standards. It would, of course, be a reasonable requirement 
that a pupil thus undertaking a project suited to his abilities 
would be expected to complete it, or else be debarred from 
the shop. 

The working out of the kind of pedagogical plan here con- 
templated may at first sight seem to require a large amount 
of teaching service ; but this will probably prove unnecessary. 
It should be expected that each learner will obtain working 
directions and suggestions chiefly from printed matter, as is 
now so often the case with boys carrying on projects at 
home, and for whom, as is well known, a great variety of 
serviceable books have been prepared. Excellent sugges- 
tions for this form of pedagogical approach can be found in 
the Boy Scout handbooks. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 481 

Furthermore, the shop should be self-governing in large 
measure. No pupil should be present against his will, and 
no one should remain who cannot readily accept the restric- 
tions which must necessarily obtain. When boys and girls 
are required to attend school, there is involved, as one con- 
dition, compulsory attendance on certain kinds of studies and 
exercises; but surely the practical arts ought not to suffer 
from the presence of the reluctant and the ill-disposed, if 
for no other reason than that the educational values of the 
subject, both for the interested and the uninterested, will 
probably then be nullified. If, indeed, it should prove nec- 
essary to compel some pupils to take practical arts work for 
any reason, then the ''compelled" ones should be given 
space apart, and perhaps should be set to work at " disciplin- 
ary" manual training — a sort of ''awkward squad," 
"guard duty," or forced labor — if we must use analogies 
from other fields where the willing must be distinguished 
from the forced, the orderly from the disorderly. 

Where a school is large and, rich enough to make a large 
variety of offerings, it will naturally happen that a given 
pupil can take but a small portion of these. It is doubtful, 
too, w^hether any serious effort should be made to induce the 
taking of one type of industrial arts project rather than 
another. If one boy prefers to confine his efforts largely 
to electrical and other mechanical projects, while another 
centers his attention for a year on printing and bookbinding, 
have we any satisfactory reasons for demurring? Again, 
if a boy wishes to execute just one project in photography, 
or printing, or shoe repairing, taking his time for perhaps 
only one month, should we complain? At least, until we 
have more experience, we shall find it desirable to provide 
for the largest amount of elasticity which is consistent with 
administrative limitations. 



21 



482 Vocational Education 

V 

PROPOSALS FOR AGRICULTURAL ARTS 

The Home Farm Project. — It is in gardening or agricul- 
ture, probably, that the soundest pedagogy of practical arts 
instruction has thus far been exemplified. School gardening 
and especially home gardening (including small live-stock 
raising) extending to the various corn, pig, and canning con- 
tests at their best, as directed by city and country schools, 
exhibit the following valuable features of practical arts in- 
struction: (a) The work is not compulsory — only those 
desiring to undertake projects do so. (b) The work is 
chiefly practical, and when at all well executed results in a 
valuable product in which the pupil and his friends can take 
pride, (c) The work organizes naturally on a project 
basis — usually individual, sometimes joint, (d) The pu- 
pil must rely largely upon his own efforts, assisted by printed 
directions; no excessive amount of teaching service is re- 
quired. (<?) The execution of projects on an amateur basis 
gives a large fund of very concrete experience, in all prob- 
ability making important contributions to cultural, physical, 
moral, and, in a degree, vocational development. (/) 
Each project offers opportunity, in addition to practical 
work, for a considerable amount of correlated reading, both 
technical and general. 

Experience has shown that home gardening (which is 
the most effective form of agricultural practical arts) re- 
quires, for its general development, the following means : 
(a) For a small state or for a portion of a large one there 
should be a general director who shall acquaint teachers with 
possibilities, issue leaflets, supervise contests (these are prob- 
ably not very necessary, and undoubtedly they develop ob- 
jectionable features), and in a general way promote public 
and educational interest in this work, (b) In each village 



The Practical Arts in General Education 483 

or city school there should be delegated to one teacher of 
some special ability the time, means, and authority to pro- 
mote home gardening, provision being made that such spe- 
cial teacher shall continue in active service with his boys 
(and some girls) through the summer months. (Probably 
one teacher can supervise the work of upward of 100 pu- 
pils.) (c) Provision should be made by the school for 
certain means and incentives such as detailed directions, 
seeds, exhibitions of products, badges, etc. 

Granted these facilities, and in cities the necessary land, 
there exist at present no reasons why in most American 
communities, public schools should not offer agricultural 
practical arts, especially to boys from twelve to fifteen, as 
an attractive and very profitable elective. 

Under rural and village school conditions, it is probable 
that a considerable number of those taking agricultural 
arts in general education will eventually enter upon farming, 
gardening, or stock raising as a vocation ; but it seems unde- 
sirable that, even where this results, serious efforts should be 
made to give the instruction and training for youths from 
twelve to fourteen a vocational bias. The amateur spirit, 
so well shown in the best home gardening now, and which 
properly combines the play spirit with interest in adult vo- 
cations and productive work, should be preserved. In cities, 
where this work probably has greater educational value than 
in the country, it is not to be expected that those taking it 
will, except in rare instances, find their way into agricul- 
tural vocations. When agricultural arts operate towards 
revealing deep interests and aptitudes (vocational guidance) , 
we may accept the result with gratitude, but without regard- 
ing such a result in the case of five or even ten per cent of our 
pupils as serious cause for attempting to develop vocational 
guidance as a primary aim in that work. 



484 Vocational Education 

VI 

PROPOSALS FOR HOUSEHOLD ARTS ^ 

The Home Project In planning for work in household 

arts, it is of primary importance to remember that substan- 
tially every girl of from twelve to sixteen years of age to be 
reached by it lives as a member of a household and in the 
constant presence of the activities involved in the purchase 
and preparation of food, selection, construction, and upkeep 
of clothing, nursing of children, home management, etc. 
The girl in the home, like the boy on the farm, has readily 
accessible in her own surroundings all the equipment re- 
quired for the pursuit of household arts. The situation 
here is radically different from anything now found in the 
domains of industrial and commercial activities, where, if 
we desire to use examples for education, we must usually 
create complete special equipment for this purpose. 

Hence, the equipment provided by the school for the 
teaching of household arts should be considered chiefly as 
complementary to that already existing in the home envi- 
ronment of the pupil, and its use should be of such a nature 
as constantly to correlate with projects executed at home 
under the inspiration and supervision of the department of 
household arts in the school. 

As in the case of those taking commercial arts, pupils 
taking household arts will in many cases later enter upon the 
vocations (homemaking, chiefly) upon which the practical 
arts work is based. Obviously, however, there is a marked 
difference. Under present conditions, few city girls enter 
upon homemaking in a genuinely vocational way until they 
are from twenty to twenty-five years of age, and after a 
considerable period of wage-earning in vocations unre- 
lated to homemaking. Hence, household arts will serve 

^ See also discussion of this topic in chapter on Homemaking 
Education. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 485 

little or no purpose as vocational guidance. But it can 
be made, without doubt, to lay important foundations 
for better appreciation, taste, utilization, and standards of 
living. 

Probably a suitable center for household arts instruction 
on the basis of non-vocational practical arts should provide 
as essential equipment the differentiated accommodations of 
a home — namely, bedroom, kitchen, and living room, with 
provision for separate parlor, dining room, pantry, cellar, 
etc., in environments where these prevail as accommodations 
for a majority of those whom the school serves. But, 
clearly, these should serve chiefly for the initial exemplifica- 
tion of projects that should, like those of home gardening, 
be executed in the home. They would be used chiefly for 
demonstration. It is needless to say that the standards 
employed in demonstration cannot greatly surpass in cost- 
liness, finish, or general excellence those accessible to the 
pupils in their homes, without nullifying the usefulness of 
the instruction given. 

As in the case of other forms of practical arts, the chief 
work of the pupils will be found in connection with proj- 
ects. Of these every home offers a wide range of possible 
choices. The following classification of projects and topics 
used in a manual prepared by a committee of the faculty of 
the household arts department of the Massachusetts State 
Normal School at Framingham has proved suggestive : 

1. The buying, preparation, and serving of food, grades 7-10: 

{a) Working projects — school and home: 

1. Preparing cocoa 

2. Rolled oats 

3. Apple sauce 

4. Fruit canning 

5. Wheat muffilis 

6. Tapioca custard 

7. Beef stew 



486 Vocational Education 

(b) Working projects — school: 

1. Pot roast 

2. Coffee 

3. Dried pea soup 

(c) Topics: 

1. Cereals 

2. Milk foods 

3. Beverages 

4. Vegetable cookery 

5. Evaporated fruits and vegetables 

(d) Home projects: 

1. The preparation of a family breakfast 

2. The canning of fruit for winter use 

(e) Observation and report projects — none 

2. The buying, making, and upkeep of clothing, grades 7-10 

(a) Home and school working projects : 

1. The making of a kimono and nightgown 

2. Repair by means of hemmed patch 

3. Making bag for dust cloth 

4. Buying, repairing, and laundering stockings 

5. Making of summer dress 

(b) Home projects : 

1. The family mending basket 

2. Shrinking of cottons 

(c) School projects : 

1. Making of pattern 

2. Pressing of ribbons 

(d) Observation and report projects : 

1. Sewing equipment 

2. The sewing machine 

(e) Topics: 

1. Study of cotton dress materials for school wear 

2. Laundering of cotton dress materials 

3. Care and repair of woolen garments 

4. Styles 

5. Clothing budget for school girl 

6. Comparative cost of home and public laundering 



The Practical Arts in General Education 487 

3. Household management, grades 7-10 : 

(a) Home working projects : 

1. Care of a bedroom 

2. The making of a bed 

3. Setting of a dining-room table 

4. Use of decorative plants in home 

5. Care of fixtures and fittings of a bathroom 

6. Campaign against household pests 

7. Decoration of living room 
{h) School working projects: 

1. Making of bed as demonstration in school plant 

2. Growing bulbs for use in home 
(c) Observation and report projects : 

1. Study of furniture arrangement in home other than 

that of pupil 

2. Ventilation of a dining room 

3. Arrangement and care of medicine cabinet 

4. Arrangement and use of cellar space 
{d) Topics: 

1. Dangers of dust 

2. The use of sunshine and open air in hygiene 

3. Decoration of the home 

4. Wall papers 

5. Labor-saving devices in kitchen 

6. Readjustments of rooms for summer use 

4. Child nursing, grades 8-10: 

{a) Home working projects : 

1. The exercise of an infant 

2. The feeding of an infant 

3. The bathing of an infant 

4. The clothing of a child one year of age 
{h) Observation and report projects: 

1. The cries of an infant 

2. The sleep of an infant 

3. The clothing of an infant under one year of age 

4. The habits of a child over one year of age 



488 Vocational Education 

(c) Topics: 

1. The feeding of an infant in hot weather 

2. The exercise and activities of a child one year of age 

3. The diseases of children — their prevention and control 

4. Infant mortality 

5. Housing, tenth grade: 

(a) Observation and report projects: 

1. The hot-air furnace 

2. House plumbing 

3. House location 

4. Use of garden space 

(b) Topics: 

1. Location of house 

2. Lighting of house 

3. Construction materials, etc. 

6. Accounting, tenth grade : 

(a) Home and school working projects: 
L The elaboration of a family budget 
2. Keeping home accounts 

(b) Topics: 

1. The card-index system 

2. Standards of living 

3. Marketing 

7. Illness, tenth grade: 

(a) Home and school working projects: 

1. Use of poultices, compresses, hot-water bags 

2. Preparation of food for sick 

3. Preparation of trays 

4. First aid 

(b) Observation and report pro j ects — school demonstration : 
L The making of a bed for invalid 

2. The giving of a bath to invalid 

3. The giving of medicine 

(c) Topics: 

1. Sick-room methods 

2. Study of poisons and antidotes 

3. Care of patient 



The Practical Arts in General Education 489 

VII 

PROPOSALS FOR COMMERCIAL ARTS 

Paralleling industrial, agricultural, and household arts in 
well-equipped junior high schools should be a division of 
commercial arts in which the aims and methods should 
closely resemble those controlling in the other divisions — 
that is, the range of activities or projects should be drawn 
chiefly from the world of trade or commerce; projects sat- 
isfying amateur instincts for productive service intermediate 
between free play and systematic productive work should 
prevail ; and considerable freedom as to individual programs 
should be allowed. 

The fields of commercial activity which seem to offer 
projects most adapted to the junior high school are : type- 
writing, bookkeeping, use of calculating machines, filing, 
drawing of commercial papers and correspondence, simple 
banking transactions employing '' school " money, and simple 
bank equipment, various buying and selling transactions, 
etc. Probably stenography is not a suitable source of work- 
able projects. 

Because of the superior attractiveness of the commercial 
occupations it will probably happen that a considerable pro- 
portion of pupils electing this division of the practical arts 
in the junior high schools will eventually enter commercial 
vocational schools, and later commercial vocations. In 
many cases parents will look upon this work as possessing 
definite vocational values and in some cases the resulting 
knowledge and skill will probably prove vocational assets. 
Nevertheless, these constitute no good reasons for giving 
prominence to the vocational aims. Parents should be defi- 
nitely informed as to the actual purposes controlling in the 
work, and through vocational guidance pupils should be 
carefully informed as to vocational possibilities ahead. For 



490 Vocational Education 

example, persons under eighteen rarely find profitable em- 
ployment as bookkeepers or typists; the amount of sales- 
manship that can be taught to girls under fifteen in schools 
can prove hardly more than a " play " asset towards real 
salesmanship as a vocation; the business world offers few 
satisfactory permanent openings to young men as typists and 
stenographers; and other facts of similar character. 

VIII 

PEDAGOGICAL UNITS FOR PRACTICAL ARTS COURSES 

Teaching Units. — However comprehensive or intricate 
the final ends of any department of education, it is necessary 
that the processes shall be greatly subdivided. As in other 
forms of work, we must break large tasks into units adapted 
to the working day, and perhaps to the working week, sea- 
son, and year. These working units may be of a strictly 
cross-section character, as, for example, where a large " job " 
is broken into units, one for each day; or they may involve 
shiftings in the kind of work done, as where a farmer sub- 
divides his large project, '' the year's crop," into such unlike 
sub-projects or stages as (a) planning the work, (b) put- 
ting soil in condition, (c) planting, (d) tillage of growing 
plants, (e) harvesting, (/) marketing, etc. 

It is the writer's conviction that in contemporary dis- 
cussion of curricula and methods, insufficient attention is 
given to the importance of organizing effective teaching 
units. The older artificial units of lesson, chapter, etc., have 
been replaced, it is true, in part by the more logical " topical " 
organization; but, unfortunately, the latter is in most cases 
probably too "logical," and insufficiently "pedagogical." 

In the practical arts field it ought not to prove difficult to 
organize a series of serviceable teaching units if the pedagog- 
ical principles suggested above prove acceptable. Obviously, 



The Practical Arts in General Education 491 

the most important of these units is the " project." As com- 
monly used and defined, the word "project" designates an 
enterprise or undertaking, the outcome and intermediate 
means and methods towards the reahzation of which are 
held in mind with considerable clearness. We furthermore 
usually associate with the word a high degree of practicabil- 
ity and an outcome of a definitely material and useful char- 
acter. We hear much of mining, industrial, agricultural, 
and commercial projects and we associate with the term 
fairly detailed plans and specifications. A " proposal " or 
" proposition " with its " projections " appealing to investors 
becomes a " project " when details have been elaborated, 
when experts have passed upon certain aspects. 

The Project. — As adapted to school practice, the term 
might well be confined to those activities which center in the 
" projection " of a plan for a concrete end to be achieved 
chiefly through constructive eJffort of hand working with 
brain and in which the achievement of the concrete and valu- 
able product is the controlling purpose sought. In this sense, 
a subject studied in books is not a project; neither is a labora- 
tory experiment in which the end is to ascertain certain facts 
to add to knowledge. Exercises, even those in composition, 
typewriting, wood-turning, and draughting, in which the con- 
trolling purpose is the enhancement of specific forms of skill 
and in which the concrete product is in reality a useless by- 
product, ought not, properly speaking, to be called projects. 

The history of manual training shows the evolution of 
certain types of project teaching. The earlier manual train- 
ing used, chiefly, exercises. Later, sloyd evolved some " real 
projects," but of a very formal and stereotyped character, 
since the sloyd project was very consciously a means to 
certain definitely conceived ends of skill and knowledge. 
More recently, manual training has foimd many real proj- 
ects, some of which link up genuinely with amateur inter- 
ests, especially in the grades. 



492 Vocational Education 

Probably home gardening and household arts (except 
where needle-work " exercises " still persist) offer at present 
best developed plans for "project" organization; manual 
training, or industrial arts, is in transition; while the com- 
mercial arts have not yet emerged from the cloudland of 
quasi-vocational education. 

However, other units besides the working project as here 
described are needed in practical arts. There is a place for 
a type of learning activity in which the pupil observes the 
operation of economic processes and their results. If the 
pupil thus observing is expected simply to retain in memory 
some of the knowledge he has acquired through observation, 
then the learning unit might perhaps be called a topic, or, 
under some circumstances, a demonstration. But if the pu- 
pil is expected to organize, formulate, document, and perhaps 
illustrate the results of his observation, then the whole 
process could legitimately be called an Observation and Re- 
port Project or, possibly, a Survey Project. For example, 
in household arts, under the general topic '' Housing " it 
would be impracticable for a girl to locate or erect a house. 
But she could derive much of value as experience and appre- 
ciation through observing systematically and carefully the 
location of one or more houses or the essential features of 
their construction. If, now, to give definiteness and intelli- 
gibility to her observations, a careful plan is made therefor, 
in the execution of which she records facts, makes drawings, 
and otherwise gives definiteness and coherence to her work, 
the whole undertaking might properly be called a "survey" 
or " observation and report " project. Other examples can 
be conceived in connection with the inspection of farm de- 
vices and product by agricultural arts pupils ; visits to mills 
and other places of concrete productive work by industrial 
arts pupils ; and observation of office procedure by commer- 
cial arts pupils. 

Topics and Readings. — At least two other kinds of teach- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 493 

ing units require a place in practical arts education — 
namely, topics and readings. Under some circumstances, 
where concrete work is not practicable, or where it seems 
desirable to assemble and interpret information from many 
quarters, the topic will prove valuable. But in practical arts 
in which emphasis must necessarily be on other than purely 
intellectual approaches and experience, the topic should al- 
ways play a minor part. 

Of much more importance, probably, will be " readings." 
Back of every practical achievement the youthful amateur 
should be conscious that there are to be found in reading 
matter descriptions, explanations, and interpretations of a 
technical, social, or popular character, opening up to him the 
world of adult enterprise. The boy who undertakes a proj- 
ect in '' wireless " should at all stages have access to every 
type of printed matter in that field that can prove suggestive; 
and similarly for the girl on a bread-making project, the 
boy or girl on a "potato-raising" project, and the girl on a 
typewriting project. Where there is shown a disposition to 
take the readings without the practical project surely it is 
only the Gradgrinds of education who would discourage the 
youth ; and where an unimaginative boy wants only the proj- 
ect, without any reading, certainly we have no good reason 
to forbid the play of his natural interests. 

IX 

THE PROBLEM OF VALUABLE PRODUCT 

The question is frequently asked, " Should a valuable 
product be sought in practical arts work ? " Or, with some- 
what different meaning, '' Should a commercial product be 
required ? " 

The question derives in part from contemporary discus- 
sion of vocational education. Here the weight of expert 



494 Vocational Education 

opinion is undoubtedly in favor of requiring a commercially 
valuable product — that is, one salable in the open market or 
fit to take the place of a commercial product in domestic or 
local consumption — as the outcome of almost all practical 
work done by students. This condition is imposed, notwith- 
standing endless difficulties of administration, because of the 
conviction that only through work on salable products or in 
rendering service which can meet commercial demands can 
sound vocational training be given. The best vocational 
schools now require that the pupil shall have his efforts 
finally measured, not only in terms of the qualitative excel- 
lence of his product as judged by market standards, but also 
in terms of quantitative output — that is, by the learner's 
rate of work. 

Amateur Production In the case of genuine practical 

arts instruction, however, where ends of liberal education 
chiefly control and the dominant spirit sought in the work is 
that of the amateur at his best, while the question of a 
valuable product is important, it does not follow that serious 
attention should be given to the production of a marketable 
or commercial product. We can think of an amateur pho- 
tographer producing photographs that will be valuable to 
his family and friends, but not salable. In the wood-work- 
ing shop, the boy may turn out a Morris chair which will long 
be cherished by his family, but which probably could not be 
marketed, even if produced in quantity. There is no inher- 
ent reason why pupils in practical arts should not produce 
large quantities of playground apparatus, construct outbuild- 
ings, and do useful work in the repair and maintenance of 
buildings, grounds, plumbing, etc., all of which must be 
defined as productive, but hardly of a commercial character. 

On the other hand, in those fields where economic activ- 
ities, specialization, and exchange are less highly organized, 
the amateur production of the school may often be substi- 
tuted for products and service to be obtained in the open 



The Practical Arts in General Education 495 

market. Thus the vegetables raised in the home garden 
will serve just as well the economy of the rural or village 
home as the product bought outside; the pastry, preserved 
fruit, and garments made in the household arts department 
will all serve to take the place of articles that otherwise must 
be purchased. 

Nevertheless, in the economic sense, this amateur practi- 
cal arts production can never assume much magnitude, since 
rate of output will hardly ever be a considerable factor in 
its pedagogy (in sharp contrast with good vocational educa- 
tion) and learners will not be held to routine repetition for 
the sake of perfecting skill (as will, again, be the case in 
effective vocational education). 

In general, then, we may expect practical arts education, 
as developed for children upwards of twelve years of age, 
to result often in products that shall appeal to their producers 
as valuable — valuable as satisfying instincts of curiosity 
and construction, as providing facilities for play, as enrich- 
ing the home, as adding to the equipment of the school com- 
munity, or even contributing to farm, village, or urban com- 
munity. The varied activities of the shops, laboratories, 
and grounds of the Gary schools have always appealed to 
the writer as being full of suggestions in these respects. 
The public services rendered in the best amateur spirit by the 
Boy Scouts also serve to point the way. In several normal 
schools in Massachusetts, notably those at Fitchburg and 
North Adams, upper grade pupils have often been enlisted 
in repair work and minor construction for the institution as 
a whole. Live rural schools frequently enlist their boys 
for various building and ground improvement projects, and 
their girls for provision of hot dishes for lunch in such a 
way as to effect excellent practical arts teaching. There is 
to be found large social value in joint or cooperative proj- 
ects where the visible local community, school, or region 
is to be benefited. Again, it is evident that project work 



496 Vocational Education 

which manifestly enriches or improves living conditions 
for the home and the family, always can be made to have a 
strong appeal. vSuccessful examples in raising vegetables, 
canning fruit, baking cakes, repairing shoes, sharpening 
cutlery and lawn mowers, making furniture, constructing 
window screens, and making dresses, already are being re- 
ported. Others can be developed in keeping accounts, writ- 
ing business letters, repairing plumbing, varnishing furni- 
ture, binding books, installing bell outfits, repairing clothing, 
etc. In these and endless others yet to be devised the really 
important ends of practical arts education in effecting gen- 
eral development, widening appreciations, and producing 
utilities in the amateur spirit can be met. 

X 

PROBLEM OF CORRELATING PRACTICAL ARTS WITH 
OTHER SUBJECTS 

For almost a quarter of a century, American educators, 
stirred thereto especially by interpretations of Herbart's 
educational doctrines, have endeavored to give general ap- 
plication to certain so-called "principles of general method." 
Of these, the principles of "interest," "correlation," and 
" inductive method " have been the most clearly defined. 

The principle of interest has been widely applied, and 
with generally good results. But, despite numberless at- 
tempts, it is probable that little of substantial value has yet 
been achieved through application of the principle of corre- 
lation. 

Each body of subject matter taught in the schools for the 
sake of building knowledge or specific useful habits tends to 
have developed its own logical form of organization — that 
is, stages, sequences, significant centers, etc. This is espe- 
cially true of those subjects described elsewhere in this chap- 
ter, which are administered towards producing " alpha " 



The Practical Arts in General Education 497 

types of learning. But the demands of correlation are for 
such a linking together of subject matter as will prevent the 
formation in the child of isolated and (apparently) unre- 
lated groups of ideas or unrelated forms of skill. In very 
few cases have the makers of textbooks or courses of study 
been successful at once in preserving the logical unity of a 
given subject — e.g. history, drawing, arithmetic, a foreign 
language, the geography of Asia — and at the same time in 
effecting any form of unified arrangement with another sub- 
ject. A few good teaching units wherein are combined cer- 
tain portions of geography and history, of gardening and 
natural science, of graphic art and construction, of literature 
and English language, have been devised; but these, if util- 
ized in each case, are only fragments of the larger subjects 
from which portions have been abstracted. In no case, so 
far as the writer is aware, has any substantial portion of the 
total content of a ''subject'* used in schools for pupils 
upward of ten years of age, been used effectively in " corre- 
lation " with another. 

Nevertheless, teachers are still always in quest of possible 
"correlations." The logical positions of those who urge 
more correlations are unassailable ; it is only when we try to 
effect practical applications that our efforts fail. 

Problems of Correlation. — In no field of subject matter 
has the desirability of correlation been more frequently 
urged than in practical arts. It readily appears that arith- 
metic and drawing are, or should be, extensively used in 
manual training; that science is of special significance in 
gardening and cooking; that accounting should play a large 
part in the commercial arts, household arts, and agricultural 
arts; that graphic and plastic art, apart from mechanical 
drawing, should figure largely in all constructive work ; and 
finally, that in all forms of practical arts there should be 
opportunity to teach, or at least to give practice in, both the 
oral and written forms of the English language. 

2K 



498 Vocational Education 

Nevertheless, here again we find few successful attempts 
at correlation which do not involve the substantial disap- 
pearance of one or the other subject as a whole or as a 
" unity." Of course, where, as in construction work for the 
lower grades (and perhaps nature study), there can be found 
no "subject" as a whole, nor any very distinctive educa- 
tional ends, then its substantial submergence in a more fully 
organized subject may not be objected to. 

But in the seventh and eighth grades, for example, both 
drawing and arithmetic are assumed to have definite ob- 
jectives peculiar to these fields, as also does manual training 
or industrial arts. Can we then successfully ''correlate" 
arithmetic and manual training? Or drawing (or fine arts) 
and manual training? Practically, it seems that this has 
not yet been done, and perhaps it cannot be successfully done. 
This does not mean, of course, that when arithmetic is 
needed in manual training, fullest possible use should not 
be made of opportunities to give practice therein — it is 
only suggested that no matter how far we carry this process 
we shall only have utilized some fragments of the subject 
"arithmetic." Again, in teaching arithmetic — that is, in 
taking the necessary steps to realize the valuable ends that 
have been set before the teacher of arithmetic — it is to be 
expected that any source of experience vital to the learner 
shall be drawn upon for concrete illustrative materials ; and 
these sources will at times include his manual training work. 
But merely drawing on such a source will not suffice to 
" teach manual training." 

The writer is of the opinion that eventually we shall suc- 
ceed in realizing some of the ideals of correlation; but in 
order to do so we must fundamentally revise some existing 
traditions and standards as to the organization of teaching 
units. For the present it is not profitable to enter into a 
discussion of what might be done in this direction. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 49Q 

XI 

PRACTICAL ARTS PLAY OR WORK ? 

No satisfactory distinctions for purposes of educational 
theory and practice have yet been drawn between play and 
work. Practical experience and common sense convince us 
that important distinctions exist in fact, and that these 
should have a vital bearing on educational programs. 

Formerly, the school was thought of as existing for work 
only — and intellectual work at that. If pupils were per- 
mitted some intermissions for play, this was done only as 
a grudging concession to recognized necessities of order and 
capacity for further work. But with more of the child's 
time at its disposal, a more humane spirit directing, and 
greater insight into child nature developing, the school be- 
gan to make provision for play as well as for work. At 
first play was thought of in the more strictly physical sense. 
Only lately has it been recognized that what may well be 
called social play (indoor group games, sociability, visit- 
ing, etc.) and intellectual play (desired reading, enjoy- 
ment of music, attendance on moving pictures, etc.) are 
also eagerly sought by children and, within limits, are like- 
wise desirable and necessary for purposes of full develop- 
ment. 

Many of the recent enrichments of the curricula of ele- 
mentary schools — often the " fads and frills " — have 
been brought in to meet a vague and not always articulate 
demand, on the part of teachers, for more abundant gratifi- 
cation of these desires for " play." But in any development 
of this kind we can always recognize the persistence of the 
old Puritan distrust of play, of anything that savors of the 
'* natural" man. " It doesn't matter what you teach a boy, 
so long as he doesn't like it, Hennessey," says' Mr. Dooley. 
The persistence of this spirit, opposed by the so-called doc- 



500 Vocational Education 

trine of interest, has led to a state of much confusion in Amer- 
ican education, a confusion growing as much out of our fail- 
ure to draw necessary distinctions between play and work, 
as from sheer distrust of play itself. 

But the drawing of some of these distinctions, even if not 
final in all respects, is absolutely essential to a proper deter- 
mination of the place of practical arts in school curricula. 
For it is inevitable and probably highly desirable that in some 
degree the best of the play spirit should enter all practical 
arts work. 

And here we must enter a warning against a too ideal- 
istic interpretation, either of child nature or of the relation 
of education to that nature. No real educator would now 
deny the very great importance of providing for a large 
number of activities for all children at least under sixteen 
years of age that can be executed in the genuine play spirit. 
On the other hand, only extreme idealists would desire to 
see the spirit of the kindergarten, even at its best, prevail to 
the entire exclusion of activities in the work spirit in the 
grades. From seven or eight years of age onward, prob- 
ably, children should spend a part of each day in definite 
work, perhaps even drudgery. The time so spent should 
not be long — thirty to ninety minutes per day divided into 
intervals of reasonable length, and rising, perhaps, at age 
sixteen to four or five hours per day — and it is manifestly 
important that the pupil and those whose opinion he re- 
spects should be convinced that the time so spent will always 
give profitable results — in terms of useful training, valu- 
able knowledge, power to proceed to higher stages of learn- 
ing, etc. Against these requirements, the pupil and those 
influencing him should be helped to recognize clearly those 
phases of school activity in which the play spirit may domi- 
nate. 

Play vs. Work. — But how shall we distinguish between 
play and work? Practically, the world makes these dis- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 501 

tinctions largely on the basis of their respective relations to 
fatigue or weariness, or accompanying lack of interest. 
Any form of activity may be play so long as the actor has 
surplus of energy and interest sufficient to make the activ- 
ity or its immediate results a pleasure in itself. But when 
it becomes necessary, because of some form of external 
pressure, to pursue the activity long after immediate inter- 
est has been exhausted, then it becomes work. We can 
think of a man with abundant energy who has done little 
walking recently, setting out to tramp to a place fifty miles 
distant. At first his walking gives him all the sensations of 
play. After perhaps five miles, he reaches the point where, 
if he were under no compulsion to proceed further, he would 
terminate the trip. But let us assume a situation where he 
must go on and complete the trip that day. He settles to 
what we should now call his task. His muscles become sore, 
fatigue sets in, all his nature cries out to him to stop. He 
labors on; he works hard. If he has no personal interest in 
the trip except to escape pain, we say that it becomes for him 
drudgery. At the outset we can conceive his desire for the 
first part of the trip to be, like his available physical energy, 
a positive or plus quantity; at the end of five miles, his 
positive desire is diminished to zero. Later it is negative, 
and increasingly so as he toils along. 

Now it is doubtless true that among artists and a few 
others, valuable contributions to the world's productive serv- 
ice are made in the play spirit, and with all the circum- 
stances of a play time; and it may be, too, that certain 
classes of routine workers, like business men, have worked 
so long that the work or routine has become essential to their 
happiness. But in general, and interpreting the common 
activities of men, work is done because it has to be done, and 
play is entered upon because of the immediate appeal it 
makes. From this point of view, the major portion of the 
school activities of children are properly to be described as 



502 Vocational Education 

work — further to be qualified, perhaps, as mental or intel- 
lectual work ; and the activities which, not prescribed, are en- 
tered upon by these same children voluntarily, willingly, 
joyously — whether games and other physical activities, 
reading, attendance on photo-plays, or constructive activi- 
ties — are to be designated as play. 

In this connection it should be noted that all modern 
schools recognize the importance of play — including kinds 
other than physical — and, where the environment of the 
pupil proves deficient in providing it, they endeavor to offer 
compensatory opportunities. All the activities of the kin- 
dergarten are supposed to be carried on in the play spirit ; in 
the lower grades it is increasingly assumed that the play 
spirit should be given free scope; and in higher grades, 
while this spirit is usually taboo in class work, the free 
activities — of athletics, social intercourse, literary clubs, 
etc. — permitted or even encouraged, are testimony to our 
approval of the play spirit. It is the writer's present con- 
viction that failure in the lower grades clearly to distinguish 
between those objectives that should be realized in the work 
spirit and those that should be achieved through the play 
spirit is a source of extensive and harmful confusion. As 
stated above, there seem to be no good reasons why even 
quite young children should not perform a certain amount of 
very definite work daily, provided the time given to it is 
suitably alternated with time for play. 

Assuming a sharp distinction to be drawn between those 
objectives of education which belong with play and those 
others that should be realized in the spirit of work, to which 
category does practical arts belong ? It is clear that in much 
of our practical arts training in the past — especially sewing 
and sloyd — the attempt has been made to hold to the spirit 
of work, the motive here being to produce the same disci- 
plinary results that were expected from the other "hard" 
subjects. In gardening, cooking, metal work, wood-turn- 



The Practical Arts in General Education 503 

ing, typewriting, etc., it has been much less easy to organize 
school work in such a way as to bring in sustained routine, 
and exacting standards with their accompaniments of toil 
and drudgery. So, perhaps in spite of teachers' intentions, 
pupils have persisted in taking these subjects much in the 
same spirit in which they take the games of the playground 
— and frequently, of course, with the result that some caus- 
tic critic would, in the spirit of Mr. Dooley, declare the ac- 
tivities so pursued (hardly to be called ''work") to have no 
"educational value." 

The thesis developed elsewhere in this section is, of 
course, that the really valuable ends of practical arts teach- 
ing are probably to be utilized through maximum utilization 
of the play instincts of children, as best expressed, perhaps, 
in the term " amateur activities," with all the flexibility, ab- 
sence of prescription, and refusal to encourage formalism, 
which that phrase implies. 

XII 

PRACTICAL ARTS ABOVE THE AGE OF SIXTEEN 

The programs of practical arts teaching suggested above 
are designed principally for children from twelve to sixteen. 
Are there places for similar offerings for youths above six- 
teen, perhaps during the last two years of the high school 
period? 

Under present economic and social conditions, from one 
half to three fourths of all persons have, on or before reach- 
ing the age of sixteen, definitely embarked on a vocation, 
either a juvenile vocation or the early stages of an adult 
vocation, or else they have entered upon specific training 
for a vocation. From ten to twenty per cent more of youths 
will at this time be preparing definitely to enter higher in- 
stitutions of learning. In all these cases, the desirability of 



504 Vocational Education 

out-of-school cultural or social interests is to be assumed, 
but it is doubtful whether these interests will take the form 
of the amateur constructive work which could be promoted 
by a school. Where practical interests are strong, it is 
usually probable that one or more years in a vocational 
school, even if that be followed by return to a general high 
school, as frequently happens, for example, in the case of 
agricultural school students, is to be preferred to further 
experience with practical arts which may tend at the later 
age to foster dilettantism. 

Furthermore, we have as yet no satisfactory knowledge 
as to how far a reasonably rich program of practical arts 
work for pupils during the years from twelve to sixteen, 
presented as a series of offerings to be elected, will satisfy 
constructive interests. It is certain that in many cases 
cultural and developmental needs, so far as they can be sat- 
isfied by practical arts education at all, will be met fully by 
the age of sixteen, when the serious purposes of life begin to 
take firm hold of the average youth. It would seem, there- 
fore, wise to devote our best efforts in planning and provid- 
ing for practical arts instruction to the years from twelve to 
sixteen. 

Probably the greatest difficulties in establishing clearly de- 
fined schemes of practical arts will be encountered in the 
departments of household and commercial arts where at- 
tempts to serve vocational ends will persist until such time 
as examples of definite vocational education for the com- 
mercial vocations and for homemaking shall have been 
worked out. It will be hard for many educators, to say 
nothing of the public, to understand why typewriting, book- 
keeping, cooking, and sewing, when taken at all, should not 
be expected to '' function" vocationally. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 505 

XIII 

PRACTICAL ARTS BELOW THE AGE OF TWELVE 

No attempt is made in the present book to interpret the 
significance and place of practical arts in the education of 
children under twelve years of age. In current practice the 
work of the first six grades (with the possible exception of 
needle-craft in some schools) has no ostensible vocational 
aim. Consequently, it can be assumed that the controlling 
aims are found in the enrichment of experience, the provi- 
sion of vital activity centers for the correlation of the more 
formal subjects, etc. In more progressive schools, the 
practical arts instruction now conforms in large measure to 
the pedagogical standards advocated by those modern edu- 
cational thinkers who have favored enrichment of curricula 
and especially the maximum employment of " natural " 
activities in the learning processes. Existing limitations of 
practice are due chiefly to the fact that teachers of children 
in the first six grades, none too well trained at best in the 
administration of practical arts instruction, are obliged to 
handle this along with all other subjects, and, frequently, 
with only the equipment that can be introduced into the 
ordinary schoolroom. Departmental teaching of practical 
arts in the lower grades is rarely found, and is not yet seri- 
ously proposed except under such conditions of fundamental 
reorganization of curricula and length of school day as are 
involved, for example, in the '' Gary system." 

The published programs of practical arts for the first six 
grades even yet reveal a wide diversity of underlying peda- 
gogical theories and practice; in fact, the existing situation 
seems filled with confusion. There is available a wealth of 
materials, but so far, little satisfactory provision seems to 
have been made for adapting these to the requirements of 
the teacher who must teach all subjects to a grade, or to 



5o6 Vocational Education 

work out effective correlations with the more formal sub- 
jects. 

It is the writer's conviction that practical arts instruction 
in the first six grades represents in many essential respects 
a field of education materially different in aims and methods 
from that discussed in this book. 



XIV 

PRACTICAL ARTS IN THE '^GARY SYSTEM^' 

One of the most impressive features of the much dis- 
cussed " Gary system "is the large amount of time given to 
practical arts. This is made possible through the eight-hour 
school day, of which a period of substantially two hours in 
length is expected to be devoted regularly to some form of 
practical arts, including drawing, even in the case of chil- 
dren in the intermediate grades. 

The distinctive features of the practical arts work (chiefly 
in industrial, commercial, and household arts fields) in the 
schools of Gary are these : pupils are expected to engage in 
serviceable or useful activities — the exercise basis is not 
approved; and the teachers in each department must be 
capable of doing skilled productive work in that department 
— whether that be bookkeeping, printing, plumbing, prepa- 
ration of meals, painting, shoe repairing, or school furniture 
making. 

Accepting as impracticable for the present any attempt 
to sell the products of the practical arts department, and rec- 
ognizing the limited demand which the homes of the pupils 
can provide, the Gary school authorities have taken over 
for the practical arts departments various forms of necessary 
work within the school system itself, such as printing forms 
and leaflets, painting buildings, repairing plumbing, wood 
and electrical work, keeping accounts, preparing and serving 



The Practical Arts in General Education 507 

of school lunches, making playground apparatus and school 
furniture, etc. For each department of work one or more 
skilled artisans or practical workers are supplied, these to 
lead in doing practical work and to use the pupils as assist- 
ants. It is intended that the productive work done by 
these departments shall not cost the school system more than 
would have been required to procure equivalent service in 
open market. 

Because of the variety of practical work offered, individ- 
ual pupils have a considerable range of election; and it is 
apparently designed that the actual administration of practi- 
cal arts work shall be exceedingly flexible in regard to re- 
quirements. For example, pupils desiring to " sample " sev- 
eral fields can take short courses in each ; while others desir- 
ing to remain a year or more in one department, e.g. print- 
ing, can apparently have their desires gratified. 

A curious arrangement is attempted for younger pupils, 
those from eight to twelve years of age. Provision is made 
whereby, on occasion, these may serve as '' helpers " or " as- 
sistants " to older pupils in their practical arts work — thus 
acquiring through observation and very elementary partici- 
pation, experience on a basis of childish experience such as 
normally comes to a boy on the farm or a girl in the home. 

No attempt can be made here to evaluate the results of the 
Gary system of practical arts teaching. Needless to say, it 
presents endless difficulties and complexities in its experi- 
mental stages (beyond which it has hardly gone as yet), 
and equally it cannot be doubted that in practice many of 
the plans held forth can be materiahzed only to a slight 
extent. 

It is essential, however, to understand clearly, in view of 
current confusion, that the practical arts work of Gary is 
not designed primarily to give preparation for a vocation. 
Its controlling purpose is to provide for actual contact with 
realities, and first-hand experience in a variety of shops 



5o8 Vocational Education 

rather than a broad experience in one shop. The system is 
organized on the idea that vocational training is the last 
thing that any of the superintendents of the plants in Gary 
would wish the schools of Gary to give, even if it were 
financially possible. The authorities think that there is no 
demand at all from the employers of labor in the Gary in- 
dustries for direct vocational education for the children of 
Gary. What they want is that the public schools send to 
them boys and girls who are strong physically, industrious, 
reliable, and intelligent. That is, they want young men who 
have had a training which gives them a foundation upon 
which they may learn the things that are to be taught in 
the industries by the industries themselves. 

From the standpoint of the theory of values held by the 
Gary school authorities, it is desirable that many boys should, 
for example, take some or many weeks in the printshop ; but 
it is quite immaterial whether any of these ever become 
printers by vocation. But in order that the printing done 
by the pupils shall effectively function in their general de- 
velopment and training, it must deal with productive proj- 
ects, be taught by real printers, and be carried on under 
approximately commercial conditions. 

XV 

ADMINISTRATIVE PROBLEMS 

The organization and administration of programs of 
practical arts education, as herein proposed, may naturally 
be expected to present many unfamiliar and difficult prob- 
lems, even to those school boards and executives who have 
already done much with household arts, manual training, 
commercial education, and gardening. On the other hand, 
the expense of providing for and conducting the work will 
doubtless be much reduced as the result of careful planning. 



The Practical Arts in General Education 509 

The following are believed to be important considerations 
relative to the administration of practical arts education for 
children from twelve to sixteen years of age : 

{a) Attendance cannot well be made obligatory in those 
classes where work of beta character is being carried out. 
Compulsory attendance as well as compulsory tasks will de- 
feat the best purposes of the work for those who voluntarily 
elect it — which, under good teaching, may be expected of 
not less than eighty per cent of all pupils. If a substantial 
minority remain who must be forced, then a special type 
of work should be devised for them, as a sort of awkward or 
recalcitrant squad under discipline. To this group could 
be relegated those forcibly excused (or excluded) from the 
volunteer classes for " non-conformity '* or " incompatibility 
of temperament." 

{h) Space, equipment, and teaching service for practical 
arts must be departmentalized. Land area and equipment 
(for gardening) and home space and equipment (for house- 
hold arts) should be sought first of all in the homes of the 
pupils, and only that should be provided in the school which 
may be required, on the average, to supplement that found 
outside. For commercial arts and industrial arts, working 
opportunities outside the school will usually be hard to get, 
hence the school must be prepared to provide room and 
equipment for these divisions. It may prove desirable in 
many cases to provide rooms for practical arts apart from 
main buildings; and such structures ought frequently to be 
erected by pupils themselves {e.g. sheds for agricultural 
tools, workshop for mechanical operations, salesrooms, even 
household arts quarters). In a number of states these 
would require only crude heating apparatus, if any, since 
pupils will presumably work standing and will be physically 
active. 

It is also important that equipment should in part be made 
by pupils, and that, as far as practicable in complicated fields, 



5IO Vocational Education 

equipment discarded in factories, on farms, in offices, and 
in homes should be employed. From the standpoint of 
many of the purposes of practical arts, second-hand and even 
obsolete types of cameras, wood-stoves, typewriting ma- 
chines, sewing machines, lathes, printing presses, drills, 
plows, plumbing, bicycles, gas engines, etc., often readily 
available, should render acceptable service. 

(c) The school program should provide for a possible 
two hours daily or ten hours weekly in practical arts, for 
all pupils who have no outside employment. In many school 
systems this would involve lengthening the school day. The 
writer favors the so-called Gary form of administration in 
this respect — a long school day, with physical play, practi- 
cal arts, and strictly academic studies, alternating in such a 
way that space and equipment suited to each major type of 
activity are in constant use. Special exemptions as to hours 
should be made for pupils having outside employment. Ob- 
viously, a large amount of flexibility in administration of 
practical arts work must be provided for. Pupils are pre- 
sumed to be free to elect any one of the major divisions ; and, 
if varied offerings are available within any one of these, to 
elect projects. As indicated above, it may also be assumed 
that pupils are free to take no practical arts at all, provided 
school time is otherwise profitably employed. 

(d) Teaching force. For any given field of education 
we can only expect to find fully equipped teachers available 
some years after we shall have defined the field and devel- 
oped a general demand for suitable teachers. Doubtless, 
few teachers are now available for the types of practical arts 
here proposed, but many manual training, commercial, agri- 
cultural, and household arts teachers could, with some en- 
couragement and special training, adapt themselves to the 
requirements of the new work. 

Eventually should be developed assistant, non-salaried 
teachers or leaders from among older pupils themselves, as 



The Practical Arts in General Education 511 

has been done so successfully among the Boy Scouts. We 
talk often about the schools as agencies to train leaders, but 
we give almost no opportunity in the organized work of 
schools (many such opportunities are found in the voluntary 
activities of the pupils themselves) for experience in lead- 
ing or directing. Of course, this assistant teaching service 
itself should be organized on a " short unit " project basis, as 
all the work in practical arts. 

{e) The financial support of practical arts education, like 
all new things sought in progressive school systems, will re- 
quire additional revenues, but probably not greatly more 
than is now given for similar work. If, through the prac- 
tical arts department, school buildings can be kept in repair 
and a variety of constructive work for the municipality be 
done, as seems to be a demonstrated possibility in Gary, a 
part of the cost, at least, would be offset. Again, as sug- 
gested above, if vocational ends are disregarded, much of 
the necessary equipment can be made by pupils, or can be 
purchased second-hand at nominal cost. 



CHAPTER XVI 

BIBLIOGRAPHIES 

The literature of vocational education consists largely 
as yet of magazine articles, school reports, and bulletins. 
The time is hardly ripe for the making of a critical bibliog- 
raphy of this material. The bibliographies referred to be- 
low are easily accessible and will suffice fairly well for the 
beginner. Students doing special work on any topic will 
find it necessary at an early stage to supplement titles found 
in these bibliographies through research of their own. 

1. Under topical titles used in the index of this book ar- 
ticles of value will often be found in : Monroe's Encyclope- 
dia of Education; Poole's Index; Readers* Guide; Bibliog- 
raphy of Books on Education in Columbia University Li- 
brary; Burnham's Bibliographies of Books on Educational 
Subjects (Clark University, 1912) ; and U. S. Bureau of 
Education's Monthly Record of Current Educational Pub- 
lications. 

2. The following are special bibliographies : National So- 
ciety for the Promotion of Industrial Education, Selected 
Bibliography on Industrial Education, Bui. No. 2 — U. S. 
Bureau of Education, Bui. No. 22 (1913) ; Bibliography on 
industrial, vocational and trade education.- — U. S. Bureau 
of Education, Bui. 10 (1912); Bibliography of Educa- 
tion in agriculture and home economics — U. S. Bureau of 
Education (June, 1914) ; List of references on vocational 
education. 

3. Valuable special bibliographies will be found in these 
books : U. S. Commissioner of Labor, Annual Report, 1910, 

2L 513 



514 Vocational Education 

pp. 521-539. . . . National Education Association, Proceed- 
ings, 1910, pp. 766-774. . . . Lapp, John, Learning to 
Earn, pp. 381-389. . . . Dean, A. D., The Worker and the 
State, pp. 345-355. . . . Monroe, P., Principles of Second- 
ary Education, passim. . . . Johnston, C. H., High School 
Education, passim. . . . Johnston, C. H., The Modern 
High School, passim. . . . Robinson, E. (Readings in) 
Vocational Education, pp. xi-xHx (useful for magazine 
references). . . . Manual Training Magazine, Vol. 17, pp. 
372-376 (bibliography of vocational surveys). 

4. For fundamental ethical and economic problems, use- 
ful bibliographies can be found in : Dewey and Tufts, Ethics 
(chapter references) ; and Guide to Readings in Social Eth- 
ics and Allied Subjects (Harvard, 1910). 



APPENDIX A. OCCUPATION STATISTICS 

The statistics reproduced below from the Thirteenth U. S. 
Census are given space here because they exhibit better than 
could any verbal description, the almost bewildering variety of 
vocations that are now followed by American workers. These 
tables, too, will abundantly repay study on the part of persons 
interested in such topics as the specialization of industrial pur- 
suits, the prevalence of women in wage-earning occupations, 
the proportions of workers in different occupations, and the 
numbers of the so-called semi-skilled in manufacturing pur- 
suits. 

Table I is an analysis of all wage-earning occupations. 
Table II illustrates the varieties of special vocations found in 
one line of manufacturing (and it will be remembered that the 
automobile industry was still in its childhood stage in 1910). 
Table III illustrates the subdivisions now made in the voca- 
tions of salesmanship. 

TABLE I. — Total Persons 10 Years of Age and Over in each Specified 
(Gainful) Occupation, Classified by Sex: U. S. Census, Vol. 10, 
1910 



Occupation 



Population 10 years of age and over 

All occupations 

I. Agriculture, forestry and animal 

husbandry 

Dairy farmers 

Dairy farm laborers 

Farmers 

Farm laborers 



Total 



71,580,270 

38,167,336 

12,659,203 

61.816 

35,014 

5,865,003 

5,975,057 



Male 



37,027,558 
30,091,564 

10,851,702 
59,240 

5,607,297 
4,460,634 



Female 



34,552,712 
8,075,772 

1,807,501 

2,576 

2,777 

257,706 

1,514,423 



SIS 



Si6 



Appendix A 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Farm laborers (home farm) . . . 

Farm laborers (working out) . . . 

Turpentine farm laborers .... 

Farm, dairy farm, garden, orchard, 

etc., foremen 

Dairy farm foremen 

Farm foremen 

Garden and greenhouse 

Orchard, nursery, etc 

Fishermen and oystermen 

Foresters 

Gardeners, florists, fruit growers, and 
nurserymen 

Florists 

Fruit growers and nurserymen . . 

Gardeners 

Landscape gardeners 

Garden, greenhouse, orchard and 
nursery laborers 

Cranberry bog laborers 

Garden laborers 

Greenhouse laborers 

Orchard and nursery laborers . . 
Lumbermen, raftsmen, and wood- 
choppers 

Foremen and overseers 

Lumbermen and raftsmen .... 

Teamsters and haulers 

Woodchoppers and tie cutters . . 
Owners and managers of log and tim- 
ber camps 

Stock herders, drovers, and feed- 
ers 

Stock raisers 

Other agricultural and animal hus- 
bandry pursuits 

Apiarists 

Corn shellers, hay balers, grain 
threshers, etc 

Ditchers 



Total 



3,310,534 

2,636,966 

27,557 

47,591 
1,086 

42,420 
1,311 
2,774 

68,275 
4,332 

139,255 

9,028 

46,541 

79,894 

3,792 

133,927 

1,384 

81,314 

17,757 

33,472 

161,268 
4,798 

114,036 
15,038 
27,396 

7,931 

62,975 
52,521 

44,238 
2,145 

5,617 
15,198 



Male 



2,133,949 

2,299,444 

27,241 

39,826 
1,001 

34,915 
1,223 
2,687 

67,799 
4,332 

131,421 

7,977 

44,186 

75,481 

Z,777 

126,453 

1,316 

76,2>72 

16,796 

31,969 

161,191 
4,798 

113,999 
15,038 
27,2>% 

7,927 

62,090 
50,847 

40,408 
2,020 

5,617 
15,198 



Fbuale 

1,176,585 

337,522 

316 



Appendix A 



S17 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Poultry raisers and poultry yard 
laborers 

Other and not specified pursuits . 
II. Extraction of minerals . 
Foremen, overseers, inspectors . 
Operators, officials and managers . 

Coal mine operatives 

Copper mine operatives 

Gold and silver mine operatives . 

Iron mine operatives 

Operatives in other mines . 

Quarry operatives 

Oil, gas and salt well opera- 
tives 

Oil and gas well operatives . 

Salt well and works operatives . 
IIL Manufacturing and mechanical 

industries 

Apprentices 

Apprentices to building and hand 
trades 

Dressmakers' and milliners' ap- 
prentices 

Other apprentices 

Bakers 

Blacksmiths, forgemen 

Blacksmiths 

Forgemen, etc 

Boiler makers 

Brick and stone masons .... 
Builders and building contractors . 
Butchers' dressers (slaughterhouse) 

Cabinet makers 

Carpenters 

Compositors, linotypers and typeset- 
ters 

Coopers 

Dressmakers and seamstresses (not 

in factory) 

Dyers 



Total 



15,384 

5.894 
964,824 
23,338 
25,234 
613,924 
39,270 
55,436 
49,603 
47,252 
80,840 

29,927 

25,562 
4,365 

10,658,881 
118,964 

28,031 

12,011 

78,922 

89,531 

240,519 

232,988 

7,531 

44,761 

169,402 

174,422 

16,351 

41,892 

817,120 

127,589 
25,299 

449,342 
14,050 



Male 



11,777 
5,796 

963,730 
23,328 
25,127 

613,519 
39,251 
55,397 
49,564 
47,169 
80,795 

29,580 

25,548 

4,032 

5,837,901 
103,369 

27,999 

31 

75,339 

84,752 

240,488 

232,957 

7,531 

44,761 

169,387 

173,573 

16,349 

41,884 

817,082 

113,538 
25,292 

1,582 
13,396 



Female 



3,607 
98 

1,094 
10 
107 
405 
19 
39 
39 
83 
45 

347 
14 

1,820,980 
15,595 

Z2 

11,980 

3,583 

4,779 

31 

31 



15 
849 

2 

8 

38 

14,051 
7 

447,760 
654 



Si8 



Appendix A 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Electricians and engineers . . . . 
Electrotypers, stereotypers and lithog- 
raphers 

Electrotypers — stereotypers . . . 

Lithographers 

Engineers (mechanical) 

Engineers (stationary) 

Engravers 

Filers, grinders, buffers and polishers 

(metal) 

Buffers and polishers 

Filers 

Grinders 

Firemen (except locomotive and fire 

department) 

Foremen and overseers (manufactur- 
ing) 

Furnacemen, smeltermen, beaters, 

pourers, etc 

Furnacemen and smeltermen . . . 

Beaters 

Ladlers and pourers 

Puddlers 

Glass blowers 

Jewelers, watchmakers, goldsmiths 

and silversmiths 

Goldsmiths 

Jewelers and lapidaries (factory) . 
Jewelers and watchmakers .... 
Laborers : 

Building and hand trades .... 
General and not specified . . , 
Helpers • — building and hand 

trades 

Chemical industries 

Fertilizer factories 

Paint factories 

Powder, cartridge, fireworks, etc., 

factories 

Other chemical factories .... 



Total 



135,519 



Male 



135,427 



12,506 


11,929 


4,368 


4,268 


8,138 


7,661 


14,514 


14,514 


231,041 


231,031 


13,967 


13,429 


49,525 


46,679 


30,496 


28,191 


10,236 


10,069 


8,793 


8,419 


111,248 


111,248 


175,098 


155,358 


36,251 


36,226 


19,735 


19,719 


10,120 


10,111 


679 


679 


5,717 


5,717 


15,564 


15,474 


32,574 


30,037 


5,757 


5,553 


10,631 


8,783 


16,186 


15,701 


934,909 


919,031 


869,478 


853,679 


65,431 


65,352 


41,741 


39,711 


9,847 


9,757 


2,959 


2,842 


4,277 


3,947 


24,658 


23,165 



Appendix A 



S19 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Clay, glass, stone industries . . . 

Brick, tile, terra cotta factories . 

Glass factories 

Lime, cement, gypsum factories . 

Marble and stone yards .... 

Potteries 

Iron and steel industries . . . . 

Automobile factories 

Blast furnaces, rolling mills . . 

Car and railroad shops .... 

Wagon and carriage factories . . 

Other iron and steel works . . . 
Other metal industries 

Brass mills 

Copper factories 

Lead and zinc factories .... 

Tinware and enamel factories . . 

Other metal factories 

Lumber and furniture industries , . 

Furniture, piano and organ fac- 
tories 

Saw and planing mills 

Other wood working factories 
Textile industries 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . . 

Other textile mills 

Other industries . 

Charcoal and coke works . . . 

Cigar and tobacco factories . . 

Clothing industries 

Electric light and power plants . 

Electrical supply factories . . . 

Food industries : 

Bakeries 

Butter and cheese factories . . 
Fish curing and packing . . . 
Flour and grain mills .... 
Fruit and vegetable canning, etc. 



Total 



Male 



154,826 


152,438 


2,388 


77,954 


77,2,ZZ 


621 


24,634 


23,686 


948 


36,083 


35,931 


152 


6,915 


6,847 


68 


9,240 


8,641 


599 


482,941 


476,801 


6,140 


15,783 


15,644 


139 


202,392 


201,030 


1,362 


48,342 


48,114 


228 


12,391 


12,232 


159 


204,033 


199,781 


4,252 


44,773 


42,134 


2,639 


10,885 


10,606 


279 


11,586 


11,532 


54 


7,945 


7,871 


74 


7,587 


6,709 


878 


6,770 


5,416 


1,354 


317,244 


313,228 


4,016 


28,077 


27,188 


889 


260,142 


258,361 


1,781 


29,025 


27,679 


1,346 


87,146 


71,107 


16,039 


37,804 


32,037 


5,767 


3,798 


2,686 


1,112 


12,290 


10,245 


2,045 


33,254 


26,139 


7,115 


426,126 


386,897 


39,229 


11,446 


11,431 


15 


16,392 


11,436 


4,956 


10,240 


5,424 


4,816 


8,176 


8,011 


165 


11,434 


10,053 


1,381 


4,510 


3,755 


755 


4,816 


4,688 


128 


4,870 


4,637 


22>Z 


9,243 


9,152 


91 


4,670 


3,683 


987 



Female 



520 



Appendix A 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Slaughter and packing houses . 
Sugar factories and refineries . 
Other food factories .... 

Gas works 

Liquor and beverage industries . 

Oil refineries 

Paper and pulp mills 

Printing and polishing .... 

Rubber factories 

Shoe factories 

Tanneries 

Turpentine distilleries 

Other factories 

Loom fixers 

Machinists, millwrights, tool makers . 
Machinists and millwrights . . . 
Tool makers, die setters, sinkers . 
Managers, superintendents (manu- 
facturing) 

Manufacturers and officials .... 

Manufacturers 

Officials 

Mechanics 

Gunsmiths, locksmiths, bellhang- 

ers 

Wheelwrights 

Other mechanics 

Millers (grain, flour, seed, etc.) . . 

Milliners and millinery dealers . . . 

Molders, founders, casters (metal) . 

Brass molders, founders, casters . 

Iron molders, founders, casters . . 

Other molders, founders, casters . 

Oilers of machinery 

Painters, glaziers, varnishers, enam- 

elers, etc 

Enamelers, lacquerers and japan- 

ners 

Painters, glaziers and varnishers 
(buildings) 



Total 



33,903 

8,755 

11,248 

16,549 

18,857 

11,215 

31,388 

7,041 

13,546 

10,277 

20,798 

6,405 

150,347 

13,254 

488,049 

478,786 

9,263 

104,210 

256,591 

235,107 

21,484 

34,787 

3,251 

Z,7Z2 

27,804 

23,152 

127,906 

120,900 

6,512 
112,122 

2,266 
14,013 

337,355 

2,999 

273,441 



Male 



Femalb 



32,471 

8,647 

8,658 

16,534 

18,294 

11,151 

29,959 

5,217 

12,224 

7,952 

20,491 

6,354 

136,675 

13,254 

487,956 

478,713 

9,243 

102,748 

251,892 

230,809 

21,083 

34,745 

3,248 

3,732 
27,765 
23,093 

5,459 
120,783 

6,509 
112,070 

2,204 
13,990 

334,814 

1,968 

273,060 



1,432 

108 

2,590 

15 

563 

64 

1,429 

1,824 

1,322 

2,325 

307 

51 

13,672 

'93 
73 

20 

1,462 

4,699 

4,298 

401 

42 



3 



39 

59 

122,447 

117 

3 

52 
62 
22, 

2,541 

1,031 

381 



Appendix A 



521 



TABLE I. — Continued 



OCCTTPATION 



Painters, glaziers and varnishers 

(factory) 

Paper hangers 

Pattern and model makers .... 

Plasterers 

Plumbers and gas and steam fitters . 

Pressmen (printing) 

Rollers and roll hands (metal) . . . 

Roofers and slaters 

Sawyers 

Semi-skilled operatives : 

Chemical industries 

Paint factories 

Powder, cartridges, fireworks, 

etc., factories 

Other chemical factories .... 
Cigar and tobacco factories . . . 
Clay, glass and stone industries . . 
Brick, tile and terra cotta facto- 
ries 

Glass factories 

Lime, cement and gypsum facto- 
ries 

Marble and stone yards .... 

Potteries 

Clothing industries 

Hat factories (felt) 

Suit, coat, cloak, overall factories 
Other clothing factories . . . . 

Food industries 

Bakeries 

Butter and cheese factories . . . 

Candy factories 

Flour and grain mills 

Fruit and vegetable canning, etc. 
Slaughter and packing houses . . 

Other food factories 

Harness and saddle industries . . 

Iron and steel industries 

Automobile factories 



Total 



60,915 
25,577 
23,559 
47,682 
148,304 
20,084 
18,407 
14,078 
43,276 

30,705 
3,920 

5,263 

21,522 

151,519 

88,628 

13,407 
41,877 

8,546 

8,539 

16,259 

144,607 

26,575 

54,211 

63,821 

88,834 

8,938 

11,598 

30,943 

3,992 

5,290 

9,448 

18,625 

22,650 

368,313 

20,902 



Male 



59,786 
24,780 
23,006 
47,676 
148,304 
19,892 
18,384 
14,078 
43,257 

17,158 
3,292 



2 ! 

ll!008 
79,947 
79,167 

12,649 
37,927 

8,417 

8,389 

11,785 

95,715 

22,377 

44,878 

28,460 

52,312 

3,008 

11,065 

13,608 

3,750 

2,127 

7,121 

11,633 

21,958 

345,271 

20,222 



Female 



1,129 

797 

553 

6 

"192 
23 

""\9 

13,547 
628 

2,405 
10,514 
71,572 

9,461 

758 
3,950 

129 

150 

4,474 

48,892 

4,198 

9,333 

35,361 

36,522 

5,930 

533 

17,335 

242 

3,163 

2,327 

6,992 

692 

23,042 

680 



522 



Appendix A 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Blast furnaces and rolling mills 
Car and railroad shops .... 
Wagon and carriage factories . 
Other iron and steel works . . . 

Other metal industries 

Brass mills 

Clock and watch factories . . . 
Gold and silver and jewelry fac- 
tories 

Lead and zinc factories .... 
Tinware and enamelware facto- 
ries 

Other metal factories 

Liquor and beverage industries . . 

Breweries 

Distilleries 

Other liquor and beverage facto- 
ries 

Lumber and furniture industries . . 
Furniture, piano and organ fac- 
tories 

Saw and planing mills 

Other wood working factories 

Paper and pulp mills 

Printing and publishing 

Shoe factories 

Tanneries 

Textile industries : 

Beamers, warpers, slashers . . . 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills ; . . 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills 

Bobbin boys, dofifers and carriers 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills 

Carders, combers and lappers . . 
Cotton mills 



Total 



Male 



70,130 


67,746 


2,384 


47,684 


47,405 


279 


22,178 


21,236 


942 


207,419 


188,662 


18,757 


69,750 


48,904 


20,846 


16,885 


14,350 


2,535 


15,628 


9,252 


6,376 


16,651 


10,474 


6,177 


1,864 


1,601 


263 


10,611 


6,674 


3,937 


8,111 


6,553 


1,558 


31,503 


29,664 


1,839 


21,830 


21,250 


580 


3,444 


2,648 


796 


6,229 


5,766 


463 


167,490 


154,292 


13,198 


62,812 


58,304 


4,508 


66,060 


63,684 


2,376 


38,618 


32,304 


6,314 


36,383 


25,803 


10,580 


67,469 


32,808 


34,661 


181,010 


121,744 


59,266 


33,553 


31,713 


1,840 


16,693 


9,612 


7,081 


7,693 


4,855 


2,838 


4,628 


1,408 


3,220 


2,570 


2,059 


511 


1,802 


1,290 


512 


22,514 


17,622 


4,892 


16,798 


14,398 


2,400 


617 


320 


297 


2,899 


1,824 


1,075 


2,200 


1,080 


1,120 


23,956 


18,050 


5,906 


15,939 


11,729 


4,210 



Female 



Appendix A 



523 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Total 



Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills . . . . . 
Drawers, rovers and twisters . . 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills 

Spinners 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills 

Weavers 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills 

Winders, reelers and spoolers . . 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills 

Other occupations 

Cotton mills 

Silk mills 

Woolen and worsted mills . . 

Other textile mills 

Other industries 

Electrical supply factories . . 

Paper box factories 

Rubber factories 

Other factories 

Sewers and sewing machine operators 

(factory) 

Shoemakers and cobblers (not in 

factory) 

Skilled occupations 

Annealers and temperers (metal) . 
Piano and organ tuners 



143 

5,358 

2,516 

29,995 

19,472 

3,825 

4,465 

2,233 

74,059 

48,025 

3,443 

13,387 

9,204 

203,718 

92,840 

36,171 

31,857 

42,850 

16,126 

7,543 

13,155 

214,992 
50,349 
13,820 
30,891 

119,932 

308,861 
24,677 
17,887 
30,283 

236,014 

291,209 

69,570 

16,808 

1,901 

6,633 



Male 



60 

4,447 

1,814 

12,480 

9,535 

1,472 

866 

607 

27,783 

15,874 

1,046 

6,997 

3,866 

104,284 

48,929 

18,435 

17,197 

19,723 

7,270 

3,226 

1,222 

932 

1,890 

101,120 

30,625 

4,995 

18,601 

46,899 

191,925 

13,636 

4,859 

20,814 

152,616 

60,003 

68,788 

16,560 

1,894 

6,528 



Female 



83 
911 

702 

17,515 

9,937 

2,353 

3,599 

1,626 

46,276 

32,151 

2,397 

6,390 

5,338 

99,434 

43,911 

17,736 

14,660 

23,127 

57,063 

24,283 

14,904 

6,611 

11,265 

113,872 

19,724 

8,825 

12,290 

73,033 

116,936 

11,041 

13,028 

9,469 

83,398 

231,206 

782 

248 

7 

105 



524 



Appendix A 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Wood carvers 

Other skilled occupations .... 

Stonecutters 

Structural iron workers (building) . 

Tailors and tailoresses 

Tinsmiths and coppersmiths .... 

Tinsmiths 

Coppersmiths 

Upholsterers 

IV. Transportation 

Water transportation (selected occu- 
pations) : 
Boatmen, canalmen and lock keep- 
ers 

Captains, masters, mates and pilots 
Longshoremen and stevedores . . 

Sailors and deck hands 

Road and street transportation (se- 
lected occupations) : 
Carriage and hack drivers .... 

Chauffeurs 

Draymen, teamsters and express- 
men 

Foremen of livery and transfer 

companies 

Garage keepers and managers . . . 
Hostlers and stable hands .... 
Livery stable keepers and managers 
Proprietors and managers of trans- 
fer companies 

Railroad transportation (selected oc- 
cupations) : 
Baggagemen and freight agents . . 

Baggagemen 

Freight agents 

Boiler washers and engine hostlers 

Brakemen 

Conductors (steam railroad) . . . 
Conductors (street railroad) . . . 
Foremen and overseers 



Total 



5,368 

2,906 

35,731 

11,427 

204,608 

59,833 

56,423 

3,410 

20,221 

2,637,671 



5,304 

24,242 
62,857 
46,510 



35,376 
45,785 

408,469 

6,606 

5,279 

63,388 

34,795 

15,598 



17,033 
12,273 
4,760 
10,409 
92,572 
65,604 
56,932 
69,933 



Malb 



5,308 

2,830 

35,726 

11,427 

163,795 

59,809 

56,399 

3,410 

18,928 

2,531,075 



5,289 
24,242 
62,813 
46,498 



35,339 

45,752 

408,396 

6,606 

5,256 

63,382 

34,612 

15,368 



17,028 
12,273 
4,755 
10,409 
92,572 
65,604 
69,693 
56,932 



Female 

60 

76 

5 

40,813 
24 
24 

1,293 
106,596 



15 

44 
12 



Z7 
7Z 



23 

6 

183 

230 



5 
"**5 

240 



Appendix A 



525 



TABLE I. — Continued 



OCCTTPATION 



Laborers 

Steam railroads 

Street railroads 

Locomotive engineers 

Locomotive firemen 

Motormen 

Officials and superintendents . . . 

Steam railroads 

Street railroads 

Switchmen, flagmen and yardmen . 

Switchmen and flagmen (steam 
railroad) 

Switchmen and flagmen (street 
railroad) 

Yardmen (steam railroad) . . . 
Ticket and station agents .... 
Express, post, telegraph and tele- 
phone (selected occupations) : 
Agents (express companies) . . . 
Express messengers and railway 
mail clerks 

Express messengers 

Railway mail clerks 

Mail carriers 

Telegraph and telephone linemen . 

Telegraph messengers 

Telegraph operators 

Telephone operators 

Other transportation pursuits : 
Foremen and overseers 

Road and street building and re- 
pairing 

Telegraph and telephone compa- 
nies 

Water transportation 

Other transportation 

Inspectors 

Steam railroad 

Street railroad 

Other transportation 



Total 



570,975 
543,168 
27,807 
96,229 
76,381 
59,005 
22,238 
19,805 
2,433 
85,147 

73,419 

2,153 

9,575 

24,138 



5,875 

22,021 
6,781 
15,240 
80,678 
28,350 
9,152 
69,953 
97,893 

14,738 

7,064 

3,843 

3,016 

815 

33,237 

27,661 

2,268 

3,308 



Male 



Female 



567,522 
539,920 
27,602 
96,229 
76,381 
59,005 
22,236 
19,803 
2,433 
85,095 

73,367 

2,153 

9,575 
22,930 



5,804 

22,018 

6,778 

15,240 

79,667 

28,347 

9,074 

61,734 

9,631 

14,333 

7,064 

3,439 

3,016 

814 

32,962 

27,525 

2,265 

3,172 



3,453 

3,248 

205 



2 
2 

""52 

52 

1,208 



71 

3 
3 

"i',oii 

3 

78 

8,219 

88,262 

405 



404 

i 

275 

136 

3 

136 



526 



Appendix A 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Laborers 

Road and street building and re- 
pairing 

Street cleaning 

Other transportation 

Proprietors, officials and managers 
Telegraph and telephone compa- 
nies 

Other transportation 

Other occupations (semi-skilled) . 

Steam railroad 

Street railroad 

Other transportation 

V. Trade 

Bankers, brokers and money lenders . 
Bankers and bank officials . . . . 
Commercial brokers and commis- 
sion men 

Loan brokers and loan company of- 
ficials 

Pawnbrokers 

Stockbrokers 

Brokers not specified and promot- 
ers 

Clerks in stores 

Commercial travelers 

Decorators, drapers and window 

dressers 

Deliverymen 

Bakeries and laundries 

Stores 

Floorwalkers, foremen and over- 
seers 

Floorwalkers and foremen in stores 
Foremen, warehouses, stockyards, 

etc 

Inspectors, gangers and samplers . . 
Insurance agents and officials .... 

Insurance agents 

Officials of insurance companies . . 



Total 



221,437 

180,468 

9,946 

31,023 

14,839 

10,089 

4,750 

38,693 

24,375 

5,187 

9,131 

3,614,670 

105,804 

56,059 

24,009 

2,111 

1,232 

13,729 

8,664 
387,183 
163,620 

5,341 

229,619 

24,030 

205,589 

20,724 
17,946 

2,778 
13,446 
97,964 
88,463 

9,501 



Male 



221,176 

180,468 

9,946 

30,762 

13,411 

8,680 

4,731 

37,729 

24,105 

5,147 

8,477 

3,146,582 

103,170 

54,387 

23,690 

1,989 
1,191 

13,522 

8,391 
275,589 
161,027 

4,902 

229,469 

24,012 

205,457 

17,649 
14,900 

2,749 
11,685 
95,302 
85,926 

9,376 



Female 



261 



261 
1,428 

1,409 

19 

964 

270 

40 

654 

468,088 

2,634 

1,672 

319 

122 

41 

207 

273 

111,594 

2,593 

439 

150 

18 

132 

3,075 
3,046 

29 

1,761 

2,662 

2,537 

125 



Appendix A 



527 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Laborers in coal and lumber yards, 
warehouses, etc 

Coal yards 

Elevators 

Lumber yards 

Stockyards 

Warehouses 

Laborers, porters and helpers in stores 

Newsboys 

Proprietors, officials and managers . 

Employment office keepers . . . . 

Proprietors, etc., elevators . . . . 

Proprietors, etc., warehouses . . . 
Other proprietors, officials and 

managers 

Real estate agents and officials . . . 

Retail dealers 

Salesmen and saleswomen 

Auctioneers 

Demonstrators 

Sales agents 

Salesmen and saleswomen (stores) 

Undertakers 

Wholesale dealers, importers and ex- 
porters 

Other pursuits (semi-skilled) . . . 

Fruit graders and packers .... 

Meat cutters 

Other occupations 

VL Public service (not classified 

elsewhere) 

Firemen (fire department) 

Guards, watchmen and doorkeepers . 
Laborers (public service) 

Garbage men and scavengers . . . 

Other laborers 

Marshals, sheriffs, detectives, etc. 

Detectives 

Marshals and constables 

Probation and truant officers . . . 



Total 



81,123 

16,663 

6,346 

43,398 

5,998 

8,718 

102,333 

29,708 

22,2,62 

2,260 

5,118 

4,393 

10,591 

125,862 

1,195,029 

921,130 

3,990 

4,380 

35,522 

877,238 

20,734 

51,048 
41,640 
4,715 
15,405 
21,520 

459,291 

35,606 

78,271 

67,234 

4,227 

63,007 

23,599 

6,349 

9,073 

1,043 



Male 



80,450 

16,655 

6,335 

43,389 

5,991 

8,080 

98,169 

29,435 

21,352 

1,540 

5,105 

4,368 

10,339 

122,935 

1,127,926 

663,410 

3,985 

1,250 

31,424 

626,751 

19,921 

50,123 
34,068 
2,677 
15,378 
16,013 

445,733 

35,606 

78,168 

66,505 

4,227 

62,278 

23,219 

6,162 

9,071 

855 



Female 



67Z 

8 

11 

9 

7 

63^ 

4,164 

273 

1,010 

720 

13 

25 

252 

2,927 

67,103 

257,720 

5 

3,130 

4,098 

250,487 

813 

925 

7,572 

2,038 

27 

5,507 

13,558 

103 
729 

729 
380 
187 
2 
188 



528 



Appendix A 



TABLE I.— Continued 



Occupation 



Sheriffs 

Officials and inspectors (city and 
county) 

Officials and inspectors (city) . . . 

Officials and inspectors (county). . 

Officials and inspectors (state and 

United States) 

Officials and inspectors (state) . . 

Officials and inspectors (United 

States) 

Policemen 

Sailors, soldiers and marines . . . 
Other pursuits 

Life-savers 

Lighthouse keepers 

Other occupations 

Vn. Professional service 

Actors 

Architects 

Artists, sculptors and teachers of 

art 

Authors, editors and reporters . . . 

Authors 

Editors and reporters 

Chemists, assayers and metallurgists 
Civil and mining engineers and sur- 
veyors 

Civil engineers and surveyors . . 

Mining engineers 

Clergymen 

College presidents and professors . . 

Dentists 

Designers, draftsmen and inventors . 

Designers 

Draftsmen 

Inventors 

Lawyers, judges and justices .... 
Musicians and teachers of music . . 

Photographers 

Physicians and surgeons 



Total 



7,134 

52,254 
33,210 
19,044 

52,926 
7,202 

45,724 

61,980 

77,153 

10,268 

2,158 

1,593 

6,517 

1,663,569 

28,297 

16,613 

34,104 
38,750 
4,368 
34,382 
16,273 

58,963 

52,033 

6,930 

118,018 
15,668 
39,997 
47,449 
11,788 
33,314 
2,347 

114,704 

139,310 
31,775 

151,132 



Male 



7,131 

49,668 
32,199 
17,469 

43,389 
6,662 

36,727 

61,980 

77,153 

10,045 

2,158 

1,552 

6,335 

929,684 

16,305 

16,311 

18,675 
32,511 
2,310 
30,201 
15,694 

58,958 

52,028 

6,930 

117,333 

12,710 

38,743 

44,437 

9,211 

32,923 

2,303 

114,146 

54,832 

26,811 

142,117 



Female 



2,586 
1,011 

1,575 

9,537 
540 

8,997 



223 

" '41 

182 

733,885 

11,992 

302 

15,429 

6,239 

2,058 

4,181 

579 

5 
5 

"*685 

2,958 

1,254 

3,012 

2,577 

391 

44 

558 

84,478 

4,964 

9,015 



Appendix A 



529 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Showmen 

Teachers 

Teachers (athletics, dancing, etc.) . 

Teachers (school) 

Trained nurses 

Veterinary surgeons 

Other professional pursuits .... 
Semi-professional pursuits .... 

Abstractors, notaries and justices . 

Fortune tellers, hypnotists, spirit- 
ualists 

Healers (not physicians and sur- 
geons) 

Keepers of charity and penal insti- 
tutions 

Officials of lodges, societies, etc. . 

Religious and charity workers . . 

Theatrical owners, managers and 
officials 

Other occupations 

Attendants and helpers (professional 

service) 

VIII. Domestic and personal service 
Barbers, hairdressers, manicurists . . 

Bartenders •. 

Billiard room, dance hall, skating 
rink, etc., keepers ...... 

Billiard and pool room keepers . . 

Dance hall, skating rink, etc. . . 
Boarding and lodging house keepers . 

Bootblacks 

Charwomen and cleaners 

Elevator tenders 

Hotel keepers and managers .... 
Housekeepers and stewards .... 

Janitors and sextons 

Laborers (domestic and professional 

service) 

Launderers and laundresses (not in 
laundry) 



Total 



20,096 

599,237 

3,931 

595,306 

82,327 

11,652 

15,677 

64,926 

7,445 

1,600 

6,834 

7,491 

8,215 

15,970 

11,322 
6,049 

18,601 

3,772,174 

195,275 

101,234 

16,761 

13,859 

2,902 

165,452 

14,020 

34,034 

25,035 

64,504 

189,273 

113,081 

53,480 

533,697 



Male 



18,988 

121,210 

2,768 

118,442 

5,819 

11,652 

7,585 

44,532 

6,660 

380 

2,162 

5,246 
6,245 
7,081 

11,027 
5,731 

10,315 

1,241,328 

172,977 

100,984 

15,943 
13,700 

2,243 
23,052 
14,000 

7,195 
25,010 
50,269 
15,940 
91,629< 

50,265 

13,693 



Female 

1,108 
478,027 

1,163 

476,864 

76,508 

8,092 

20,394 

785 

1,220 

4,672 

2,245 
1,970 
8,889 

295 
318 

8,286 

2,530,846 

22,298 

250 

818 

159 

659 

142,400 

20 

26,839 

25 

14,235 

21,452 

3,215 

520,004 



2M 



530 



Appendix A 



TABLE I. — Continued 



Occupation 



Laundry operatives 

Laundry owners, officials and man- 
agers 

Midwives and nurses (not trained) . 

Midwives 

Nurses (not trained) 

Porters (except in stores) 

Restaurant, cafe and lunchroom keep- 
ers 

Saloon keepers 

Servants 

Bell boys, chore boys, etc. . . . 

Chambermaids 

Coachmen and footmen 

Cooks 

Other servants 

Waiters 

Other pursuits 

Bathhouse keepers and attendants . 

Cemetery keepers 

Cleaners and renovators (clothing, 
etc.) . . . 

Umbrella menders and scissors 
grinders 

Other occupations 

IX. Clerical occupations 

Agents, canvassers, and collectors . . 

Agents 

Canvassers 

Collectors 

Bookkeepers, cashiers, accountants . 
Clerks (except clerks in stores) . . . 

Shipping clerks 

Other clerks 

Messenger, bundle and office boys . . 

Bundle and cash boys and girls . . 

Messenger, errand and office boys . 
Stenographers and typists 



Total 



111,879 

18,043 

133,043 

6,205 

126,838 

84,128 

60,832 
68,215 

1,572,225 

18,329 

39,789 

25,667 

450,440 

1,038,000 

188,293 

29,670 

4,595 

4,842 

14,860 

1,053 

4,320 

1,737,053 

105,127 

50,785 

18,595 

35,747 

486,700 

720,498 

80,353 

640,145 

108,035 

10,866 

97,169 

316,693 



Male 



35,899 

17,057 
15,926 

15,926 
84,055 

50,316 

66,72A 

262,676 

17,667 

187 

25,667 

117,004 

102,151 

102,495 

25,223 

3,125 

4,811 

12,215 

1,016 

4,056 

1,143,829 

96,325 

48,495 

13,980 

33,850 

299,545 

597,833 

78,192 

519,641 

96,748 

4,274 

92,474 

SZ,Z7S> 



Female 

75,980 

986 
117,117 

6,205 

110,912 

73 

10,516 

1,491 

1,309,549 

662 

39,602 

333,436 

935,849 

85,798 

4,447 

1,470 

31 

2,645 

Z7 
264 

593,224 
8,802 
2,290 
4,615 
1,897 

187,155 

122,665 
2,161 

120,504 

11,287 

6,592 

4,695 

263,315 



Appendix A 



531 



TABLE II. — Statistical Analysis of Special Vocations within a Certain 
Industry : U. S. Census, 1910 



Automobile factories . 

Manufacturers and pro- 
prietors 

Officials 

Managers and superin- 
tendents 

Foremen and overseers 

Bookkeepers, cashiers, 
accountants . 

Clerks (general) 

Clerks (shipping) 

Designers . . . 

Draftsmen . . 

Messenger, errand and 
office boys .... 

Purchasing agents . 

Stenographers and typ 
ists .... 

Blacksmiths . . 

Boiler makers . 

Cabinet makers 

Carpenters . . 

Electricians and electri- 
cal engineers . . . 

Engineers (mechanical) 

Engineers (stationary) 

Locksmiths 

Machinists 

Mechanics (not other- 
wise specified) . . . 

Millwrights 

Painters 

Plumbers 

Tinners 

Tool makers 

Wheelwrights . . . . 

Apprentices 

Assemblers and erectors 

Bench hands 



Total 
Workers 

105,758 
987 

1,613 
2,342 

2,299 

4,304 

718 

155 

1,071 

334 

240 

2,074 

1,341 

7Z 

454 

1,398 

1,196 

318 

720 

58 

28,659 

1,766 

398 
4,131 

288 
1,064 
1,737 

142 
1,104 
3,648 

469 



Total 
Workers 

Body makers (not spe- 
cified) 1,338 

Braziers 117 

Carriage and wagon 

builders 214 

Case and steel hardeners 85 

Chauffeurs 780 

Core makers 252 

Drillers 553 

Engine and motor build- 
ers (not specified) . . 102 

Filers 208 

Finishers 943 

Firemen 234 

Fitters 105 

Forgemen and hammer- 
men 209 

Grinders (metal) . . . 499 

Helpers 942 

Inspectors 1,258 

Laborers 15,692 

Lamp makers (notspeci- 

ified) 155 

Lathe hands and turners 338 
Machine hands (not 

specified) 1,957 

Metal workers (not 

specified) 660 

Molders 529 

Oilers 115 

Packers and wrappers . 148 

Pattern makers . . . 526 

Platers HI 

Polishers 1,429 

Press hands 245 

Repairers 687 

Rubber workers (not 

specified) 169 

Sewers 189 



532 



Appendix A 



TABLE II. — Continued 



Solderers 

Teamsters 

Testers 

Top makers (not speci- 
fied) 

Trimmers 



Total 

WORKEBS 

167 
260 

1.578 

249 
2,303 



Upholsterers 

Woodworkers (not speci- 
fied) 

Other specified occupa- 
tions 

Not specified occupations 



Total 

WOBKEKS 

583 

1,587 

1,484 
1,474 



TABLE in. — Statistical Analysis of Certain Commercial Vocations 

U. S. Census, 1910 



Total 
Workers 

Wholesale and retail 

trade 3,577,771 

Merchants and dealers 

(wholesale) : 
Importers and exporters 4,905 

Jobbers 3,181 

Other wholesale dealers 42,962 
Merchants and dealers 

(retail) : 
Agricultural implements 

and wagons .... 8,518 

Art stores and artists' 

materials 2,370 

Automobiles 4,597 

Bicycles 1,532 

Books 3,118 

Boots and shoes . . . 19,346 
Butchers and meat deal- 
ers 124,048 

Buyers and shippers of 

grain 11,535 

Buyers and shippers of 

live stock 32,516 

Buyers and shippers of 

other farm produce . 6,864 

Buyers and shippers (not 

specified) 896 



Total 
Workers 

Candy and confection- 
ery 29,538 

Cigars and tobacco . . 17,728 
Carpets and rugs . . . 1,238 
Clothing and men's fur- 
nishings 35,273 

Coal and wood .... 24,466 

Coffee and tea .... 5,351 
Crockery and glassware, 

queensware .... 2,508 
Curios, antiques and 

novelties 2,735 

Delicatessen stores . . 3,031 

Department stores . . 8,970 

Drugs and medicines . 67,575 
Dry goods, fancy goods 

and notions .... 65,283 

Five and ten cent stores 4,331 

Florists (dealers) . . . 2,934 

Flour and feed .... 9,469 

Fruit 19,000 

Furniture 22,209 

Furs 2,280 

Gas fixtures and electri- 
cal supplies .... 1,526 
General stores .... 88,059 
Groceries 195,432 



Appendix A 



533 



TABLE III. — Continued 



Total 

WOKKERS 

Hardware, stoves and 

cutlery 39,663 

Harness and saddlery 7,541 

Hucksters and peddlers 80,415 

Ice ■ . . 7,361 

Jewelry 29,962 

Junk 15,219 

Leather and hides . . . 2,475 

Liquors and wines . . 17,736 

Lumber 26,485 

Milk 14,694 

Music and musical in- 
struments 5,222 



Total 

WOBKERS 

Newsdealers 7,075 

Oil, paint and wall 

paper 6,818 

Opticians 6,284 

Produce and provisions 29,639 

Rags 1,975 

Rubber goods .... 493 

Stationery 5,823 

Timber 765 

Other specified retail 

dealers 20,383 

Not specified retail deal- 
ers 54,725 



APPENDIX B. TERMINOLOGY^ 

PRELIMINARY 

Education is still largely in the " prescientific " stages of its 
development. As a consequence, it derives its terms and sym- 
bols almost exclusively from the everyday vernacular of the 
people. But the terminology thus developed necessarily lacks 
in definiteness and consistency. No two speakers on a given 
subject will be found to use terms derived from the popular 
language in exactly the same sense. Great confusion and 
waste of effort thus result. 

The time has not yet arrived for educators to do what has 
been done in the fields of medicine, engineering, scientific agri- 
culture, and other fields of applied science — that is, develop a 
technical terminology consisting of new terms and symbols 
coined for the purpose, and giving exact and unvarying mean- 
ings. In education it will be necessary for some time to con- 
tinue to use, in the main, the old familiar words and phrases, 
with their numerous variations of meaning and their almost 
unlimited special connotations. 

But educators can do this : They can agree to use certain 
words and phrases for the time being in certain definite ways, 
and with certain consistent meanings, and when making depar- 
tures from this usage clearly indicate the grounds and extent of 
their divergence from the meaning agreed upon. 

To this end there is required a series of definitions of the 
terms most frequently employed in education, and furthermore, 
such an extended analysis, with abundance of concrete illus- 

1 These explanatory definitions were first prepared by the author for 
a committee on vocational education of the National Education Asso- 
ciation, and published as Bulletin 24 (1916) of the U. S. Bureau of 
Education. Suggestions made by many friendly critics have been freely 
used in revising them for this book. 

• 534 



Appendix B 535 

tration, as will show to anyone acquainted with educational 
thought actually what is meant by the nomenclature thus es- 
tablished. Most persons find it difficult to translate abstract 
terms and phrases into concrete and definite meanings. It is 
obvious also that during any period of marked activity in the 
development of an educational movement, new and varied sit- 
uations arise which interest laymen as well as schoolmen. The 
very rapidity of that growth often anticipates the development 
of a clearly defined theory of education or social economy. To 
assist somewhat in avoiding the confusion in thinking and 
language resulting from the above conditions, this chapter 
has been prepared. The usual plan has been to follow and 
precede definitions with an extended analysis of the ideas in- 
volved, and to append numerous concrete illustrations of the 
types of vocational education referred to. 

The earlier developments of this type of education in the 
United States began in Massachusetts. Consequently, there has 
grown up in that state a considerable background of theory, 
practice, and experience which has necessitated the use of 
terms with rather clearly defined meanings. For this reason 
some of the suggestions as to the use of terms and meanings 
are based upon usages originating there, more particularly by 
the board of education, which was required by law to super- 
vise various forms of vocational education. This had made 
it necessary to evolve, and use consistently, a somewhat definite 
terminology. Other terms and definitions have, however, been 
utilized in this terminology. The whole is to be regarded as 
an effort somewhat to overcome the tendency in one field of 
education to follow a loose, general, and sometimes almost 
meaningless terminology. 

/. General Definitions and Distinctions 

1. (Definition). Vocational education is any form of edu- 
cation, whether given in a school or elsewhere, the purpose of 
which is to fit an individual to pursue effectively a recognized 
profitable employment, whether pursued for wages or other- 
wise. 



536 Appendix B 

Webster's Dictionary defines vocation as follows : Destined 
or appropriate employment, calling, occupation, trade, business, 
profession. 

Among the specific occupations for which vocational educa- 
tion may be given are the following: Physician, electrical en- 
gineer, teacher, bookkeeper, salesman, stenographer, machinist, 
plumber, bricklayer, printer, dressmaker, cook, weaver, gar- 
dener, florist, farmer, poultryman, homemaker, mother's assist- 
ant, domestic servant, sailor, fisherman. This list is capable 
of being added to indefinitely. There are, at least, some hun- 
dreds of different occupations for each of which specific voca- 
tional training is practicable. 

(a) By " purpose " is here meant the purpose or aim which 
is held in view, and in conformity with which all steps are taken, 
in arranging programs of instruction, selecting practical work, 
devising tests, etc. The aim is said to " control " the selection 
of the means and methods of instruction used in realizing the 
aim. 

For example, if it is the purpose of given courses of training 
respectively to produce a machinist, a physician, and a printer, 
the requirements of these respective occupations will control in 
the choice of the materials and methods of instruction. In the 
vocational course, as such, rriatter will not be included which 
does not have a clearly perceived relationship to efficiency in 
the vocation. 

{h) The purposes which should control in a given program 
of vocational education obviously can be found only by study- 
ing the vocation itself for which training is to be given. On 
the basis of the results of this study, means and methods of 
training and instruction must be devised, and a predetermined 
degree of efficiency in the proposed calling constitutes the aim 
or objective, in the light of the demands of which the means and 
methods of such training and instruction are selected. 

For example, the means and methods employed in the train- 
ing of a printer may differ absolutely from those employed in 
the training of a house carpenter. What means (including 
thereunder subjects of study, courses of instruction, textbooks, 
material equipment, etc.) and methods (methods of teaching, 



Appendix B 537 

class organization, adjustment of practical to technical work, 
etc.) shall be employed in each case will depend wholly upon the 
requirements of the occupation itself. 

(c) The extent to which training can be given for a recog- 
nized vocation will, in the last analysis, also depend upon the 
inherited and acquired powers of the individual who is to be 
trained, and on the economic conditions determining the age 
at which the person enters upon the pursuit of a given occupa- 
tion. 

In common practice, only persons of exceptional native en- 
dowment and opportunities for prolonged study are admitted 
to classes preparing for the practice of medicine, engineering, 
teaching, etc. In every trade school, many applicants are re- 
fused, or are early eliminated, because of physical or other un- 
fitness for the successful pursuit of the trade. A person 
obliged to become self-supporting at 14 or 15 years of age 
cannot reasonably be expected to profit from the introductory 
stages of prolonged courses of instruction designed to require 
the time of a more favored student up to the age of 18 or 20. 

{d) In practice, any program of vocational education should 
be based upon the requirements of a definitely analyzed calling, 
and the means and methods should be modified, so far as prac- 
ticable, with a view to their adjustment to the needs and possi- 
bilities of a group of individuals having a common purpose, and 
possessed of somewhat similar qualifications. 

(^) Vocational education of any specific kind " functions " 
when, as a result of a definite amount of training, an ascertain- 
able degree of proficiency in the exercise of a vocation is shown 
in the individuals trained. 

For example, if it can be shown that a given course of in- 
struction (embracing practical training and theoretical instruc- 
tion) in dentistry produces in most of those taking such course 
a definite ability successfully to practice dentistry, then such 
training is said to " function " effectively. Again, if in the 
case of a young man, already a successful worker in the ma- 
chine shop calling, a definite series of short units of training in 
some form of mathematics or drawing adds obviously to his 
industrial ability, then such training is said to " function." If, 



538 Appendix B 

on the other hand, 40 per cent or 50 per cent of the persons 
completing, for example, a course of study alleged to fit for 
farming are able to show no marked improvement in practice 
as a result of such training, or if an equal number, after hav- 
ing had such training, enter other callings, then the " function- 
ing " of such instruction may be regarded as doubtful or im- 
perfect. 

2. Major divisions of education of equal rank with voca- 
tional education. — Other major divisions of education be- 
sides vocational education are : Physical education, social edu- 
cation and cultural education. Physical education may be 
held to embrace all forms of training and instruction the con- 
trolling purposes of which are to conserve and promote useful 
development of the body and its capacity for effective " func- 
tioning." Social education may include all forms of training 
and instruction designed to make for better group living and 
activities. Included under this head are moral education, civic 
education, ethical training, and much of religious instruction. 
Cultural education may here include all forms of training and 
instruction designed to develop valuable cultural interests of 
an intellectual and sesthetic nature, including permanent in- 
terests in such fields as art, literature, science, and history. 
Cultural education also includes training in the use of intel- 
lectual " tools," or " instrumentalities " of general (not particu- 
lar, i.e. vocational) application, such as the efficient use of the 
vernacular language in reading, writing, and speaking, a second 
language, etc. Social education and cultural education are often 
described jointly as " general " and in later stages as '' liberal " 
education. 

3. Distinction between general and vocational educa- 
tion. — General education aims to develop general intelligence, 
powers of appreciation in all common fields of utilization, and 
powers of execution with such intellectual instruments as lan- 
guage, mathematics, scientific method, etc., without reference to 
recognized or specific callings ; while vocational education has 
its aims, and, therefore, its means and methods, determined in 
any case by the requirements of a specific calling. 

For example, experience proves that it is desirable for all 



Appendix B 539 

persons to be trained to read and to write, without reference to 
the specific callings which they may ultimately pursue. 
Equally, all people should be trained to appreciate and to 
choose wisely for their own use valuable products from such 
fields of human effort as literature, art, economic goods, and the 
specialized service of others. All persons should also be trained 
in the habitual actions, appreciations, knowledge, insight, and 
ideals, which constitute approved moral conduct and good cit- 
izenship. The forms of education designed to produce these 
ends may be further subdivided and described by such terms as 
" elementary education," " academic education," " general sec- 
ondary education," etc. 

4. Distinction between vocational and practical arts educa- 
tion. — Vocational education is also to be distinguished from 
various forms of so-called " practical education," which may 
resemble, in their processes, vocational education, but which do 
not result in definite forms of vocational efficiency. 

The various forms of non-vocational education here comprised 
under the term " practical arts," include manual training, 
sloyd, manual arts, arts and crafts when pursued as part of 
general education, household arts, simple gardening and agri- 
cultural education, many phases of commercial education, etc. 
(a) The various forms of practical arts education as now 
given in schools are not properly vocational, although some- 
times mistaken for vocational education, because they do not 
result, except by chance, in recognized forms of vocational 
efficiency, nor are they assumed to be given to persons who have 
defined vocational aims. The means and methods they adopt 
are not selected with a view to the preparation of the pupil for 
recognized callings. 

{h) Various forms of practical arts education have an im- 
portant and valuable place in general or liberal education, as a 
means of enlarging general intelligence, developing sound ap- 
preciation of economic products, and, in part, in laying the foun- 
dations for vocational choice. 

(c) Practical arts education is sometimes termed " prevoca- 
tional education," because of the belief that a suitable program 
of practical arts training will make important contributions 



540 Appendix B 

toward the individual's ability to choose a vocation wisely. Its 
value to this end depends largely upon the degree to which the 
individual has already developed vocational interest and a de- 
sire to choose a suitable vocation. 

5. Distinction between direct (or systematic) vocational 
education and indirect vocational education. — A large amount 
of vocational education, in the broad sense of that term, espe- 
cially for the unskilled or semi-skilled occupations, is an indirect 
result or a by-product of association and cooperation with older 
people engaged in productive occupations. One is said to 
"pick up " skill, vocational intelligence, or vocational ideals in 
this way. Among primitive peoples usually, and even in civil- 
ized society in many fields, such as homemaking and farming, 
indirect vocational education is common. There is a tendency 
in society to substitute systematic or direct vocational educa- 
tion for indirect (and therefore, presumably, uneconomic and 
ineffective) procedures. 

6. Distinction between systematic vocational education 
through schools and through other agencies. — Vocational 
education may be carried on through a school (an agency spe- 
cialized for this purpose) or through other agencies, primarily 
specialized for other and, usually, profit-making purposes, and 
only secondarily adapted to systematic vocational education. 
Apprenticeship in the trades, and, originally, in the professions, 
is an example of such non-school systematic vocational educa- 
tion. Farmers and homemakers sometimes quite systemati- 
cally train their children to follow their own vocations. Com- 
mercial establishments often provide for the definite instruc- 
tion and advancement of young assistants. There is a manifest 
tendency on the part of society to transfer to school agencies 
vocational education, because of the greater degree of concen- 
tration and effectiveness thus made possible, and because, under 
modern conditions, economic agencies are unable to give due 
attention to systematic vocational education as a secondary 
phase of their responsibilities. 

7. Distinction between private and public vocational schools. 
— Vocational schools may be supported by private agencies 
either through endowments or through fees received from stu- 



Appendix B 541 

dents. Such schools, when controlled by private agencies, are 
called " private vocational schools." They may further be 
distinguished according as they are (a) endowed with more or 
less philanthropic intent, and having no object of profit in view ; 
or (6) as being on a commercial basis in having profit making 
as a chief end. Public vocational schools are those supported, 
at least in part, under public expense, and are usually under 
the control of publicly constituted authorities. Professional 
schools in state universities, trade and commercial schools 
conducted by municipalities, agricultural and homemaking 
schools conducted by states or subdivisions thereof, etc., 
are examples of public vocational schools. 

As a rule, professional schools in the United States have not 
been organized for profit. Many commercial, and some trade 
schools, are conducted for profit. Philanthropy has also en- 
dowed many trade schools for dependent or defective chijdren. 

//. Major Divisions of Vocational Education 

1. Major divisions of occupations. — The economic or pro- 
ductive occupations (as distinguished from leisure and cultural 
occupations) which men and women follow (chiefly for self- 
support) may, for convenience, be grouped in six large classes; 
namely, the professions, the agricultural pursuits, the com- 
mercial pursuits, trades and industries, homemaking pursuits, 
and nautical pursuits. 

The major divisions of wage-earning occupations recognized 
by the last United States census are : The professions ; agricul- 
ture; domestic and personal service; trade; clerical occupa- 
tions; public service; mining; manufacturing and mechanical 
industries ; and transportation. The United States census does 
not recognize the division of nautical pursuits, nor does it 
include homemaking pursuits (because non- wage-earning) 
under the head of domestic occupations. For convenience 
here mining, manufacturing, and transportation are classed as 
" industrial " pursuits ; and trade and clerical occupations as 
" commercial pursuits." 

2. Major divisions of vocational education. — The suitable 
major divisions of vocational education, corresponding, in the 



542 Appendix B 

main, to those of the economic occupations, are these: Profes- 
sional education, vocational commercial education, vocational 
agricultural education, vocational industrial education, voca- 
tional homemaking education, and nautical education. 

It is advantageous to subdivide vocational education into the 
six divisions given above, because each division has many of its 
own distinctive pedagogical characteristics, based largely upon 
the phases of the occupation for which training is being given. 
It is clear, however, that in many cases a hard and fast classi- 
fication will not be practicable. For example, cooking as a 
wage-earning occupation will be classed under the industries, 
whereas cooking as a part of homemaking will come properly 
under homemaking education. 

For other purposes, vocations may be grouped into (a) those 
requiring a relatively large amount of technical or abstract 
knowledge, such as the practice of medicine, law, teaching, en- 
gineering, and bookkeeping; and (b) those requiring or appear- 
ing to require a relatively large proportion of manual or other 
form of bodily skill, such as dentistry, machine-shop practice, 
dressmaking, and farming. In popular language, the distinc- 
tion is made between " brain workers " and " hand workers." 
Also, it is important to make distinctions based on the suitable 
age at which workers can take up vocations (the so-called "age 
of efficient entrance into industry"). A person is rarely ex- 
pected to take up responsible work in the practice of medicine 
before the age of 22 or 23 ; in engineering before the age of 20 ; 
and in teaching at least before the age of 18. Many trades can- 
not be followed effectively until the worker has reached the age 
of 18, on account of the bodily strength required, or responsi- 
bility with machinery. Again, industrial vocations are fre- 
quently divided into the skilled and unskilled, to many of the 
former the word " trade " being applied. 

(a) Because many forms of apparently practical education 
(i.e. training for productive pursuits), which are not in reality 
vocational (as defined above), are already designated by such 
terms as " commercial," " agricultural," '' industrial," etc., it 
seems necessary that the term " vocational " should be included 
in each designation of a form of vocational education except 



Appendix B 543 

the professional and nautical, as " vocational commercial edu- 
cation," " vocational agricultural education," etc. 

{h) There is a sense in which the term " industrial " is also 
applied to many occupations lying outside of the trades and 
manufacturing pursuits, as when we speak of " industrial his- 
tory," " industrial disturbances," " industrial and political de- 
velopment," etc. This usage has also been extended to the 
field of education, so that there is a popular sense in which *' in- 
dustrial education " means nearly every form of vocational edu- 
cation, except, perhaps, homemaking and professional educa- 
tion. This loose and indefinite usage should be discouraged. 

3 (Definition). Professional education includes those 
forms of vocational education the direct purpose of each of 
which is to prepare individuals for the successful pursuit of a 
recognized profession. 

Among the professions recognized by the United States cen- 
sus are: Law, medicine, engineering, journalism, theology, 
architecture, acting, dentistry, teaching, music, literature. 

Leadership in agriculture, leadership in war, and leadership 
in institutional management should probably also be included 
among the professions. 

(a) Vocational education for the professions, like voca- 
tional education for the trades, was formerly carried on through 
apprenticeship, but now schools of medicine, law, theology, and 
military leadership have entirely replaced apprenticeship as a 
means of systematic vocational education for these professions. 
Schools for these professions originated in some cases several 
centuries ago. Vocational schools of engineering and teaching 
were first founded early in the nineteenth century. Almost 
every profession (except acting, and, in a measure, secondary 
school teaching and journalism) now has numerous well-or- 
ganized schools of vocational training. Conscious apprentice- 
ship methods seem to survive only in training for nursing and, 
in a measure, acting and journalism. 

(h) In some professions, such as medicine, law, and teach- 
ing, the state safeguards standards by means of certification or 
licensing. In these cases the requirements of such certification 
greatly affect standards of vocational school work. The 



544 Appendix B 

practice of state certification is carried much further in Euro- 
pean countries than in America. 

(c) Certain studies found in schools or colleges, prelimi- 
nary to the professional course, are now recognized as prepara- 
tory or " prevocational " to professional study. Examples of 
these are biology as prevocational to medicine; history and 
economics as prevocational to law ; trigonometry and physics as 
prevocational to engineering; etc. It was formerly asserted 
that studies such as Latin and modern languages were prevoca- 
tional to almost all of the professions. The validity of this 
contention is now disputed. 

4 (Definition). Vocational commercial education includes 
those forms of vocational education the direct purpose of each 
of which is to fit for some recognized commercial calling. 

Among the commercial callings enumerated by the United 
States census are those of agent, banker and broker, bookkeeper 
and accountant, clerk and copyist, commercial traveler, mer- 
chant and dealer (retail), merchant and dealer (wholesale), 
messenger and office boy, officials of banks and companies, 
packers and shippers, salesmen and saleswomen, stenographers, 
etc. 

Most of the training for commercial pursuits is still obtained 
in and through the callings themselves. Schools for systematic 
vocational commercial training exist for only a few occupations, 
such as those of bookkeeping and accountancy, and stenography 
and typewriting. A few schools have also been founded to 
train salesmen and saleswomen, clerks, etc. 

(a) It is desirable that steps be taken to analyze and define 
the essential features of the various commercial occupations 
for purposes of adapting to each its appropriate vocational 
training. For examples, there are two distinct forms of 
salesmanship, namely, counter or indoor salesmanship and field 
or traveling salesmanship. These various types require dif- 
ferent school training. But each of these will also be specialized 
according to types of articles sold and conditions of selling. 
Selling automobiles has little in common with selling books. 

(6) The term "commercial education'' has also long been 
employed to designate courses of study dealing with specific 



Appendix B 545 

phases of practice or knowledge applicable in, or derived from, 
the commercial callings. Such education has frequently been 
fostered as vocational education, although its actual outcome 
in vocational efficiency — that is, its positive vocational " func- 
tioning" — has not been demonstrated and is still in doubt. 
This has, perhaps, been particularly the case when these al- 
leged vocational studies have been carried on in public high 
schools. The approach to them has usually been bookish and 
theoretical, and comparatively slight effort has been made to 
base either practice or intellectual study on the actual require- 
ments of commercial callings. 

The studies commonly employed in this capacity are account- 
ancy, bookkeeping, commercial law, industrial history, history 
of commerce, business arithmetic, typewriting, stenography, 
business practice, etc. 

(c) Much so-called " commercial education " in public and 
private schools doubtless has, or can be made to have, value 
as a part of liberal or general education designed to give young 
people some appreciation of, and insight into, the commercial 
occupations. Training and instruction of this character might 
also do much in directing young people toward efficient choice 
of commercial occupations and in giving vocational ideals. 

{d) Unfortunately, no clearly defined line is yet drawn, 
especially in public schools, between commercial studies that 
are expected to " function " vocationally and those which are 
designed as part of a general or liberal education. This is a 
source of much misdirected effort, and probably many young 
people are permanently handicapped by the failure of schools to 
distinguish between these two objectives. 

5 (Definition). Commercial education, or preferably '' com- 
mercial arts education," includes those studies derived from, 
or based upon, the commercial pursuits which are designed to 
give liberal or general education and to contribute to vocational 
guidance and vocational ideals in the field of the commercial 
occupations. 

The term " commercial arts education " may seem somewhat 
forced in this connection, but there are good analogies in the 
departments of industrial arts education, agricultural arts edu- 
cation, and household arts education (which see). 



546 Appendix B 

6 (Definition). Vocational agricultural education includes 
those forms of vocational education the direct purpose of each 
of which is to prepare students for some one of the agricultural 
occupations. 

Among agricultural occupations are those of agricultural la- 
borer (in various varieties), dairyman, farmer or planter (many 
species), gardener, florist or nurseryman, stock raiser, bee 
keeper, poultry keeper, etc. 

Agricultural education of various kinds is now given in 
agricultural colleges. This includes much work of an essen- 
tially secondary grade (in extension classes, etc.), while a part 
of it is of a collegiate or professional level. A small number of 
agricultural secondary schools are also equipped to give actual 
vocational education toward agricultural pursuits. 

Agricultural occupations being as yet less specialized than 
either professional or industrial occupations, agricultural edu- 
cation preserves a relatively general character. Much so-called 
" agricultural education " is still only quasi-vocational, because 
it does not give definite and actual preparation for agricultural 
vocations. But short lecture courses and demonstrations are 
valuable when offered to experienced farmers, capable of 
carrying the knowledge thus acquired into practice, making it 
" function." 

(a) The term " agricultural education " is also applied to 
various forms of agricultural study, frequently having as an 
alleged end vocational education in agriculture. As found in 
most schools, the studies embraced under agricultural educa- 
tion are usually bookish and theoretical. Their actual " func- 
tioning " in competency to pursue such callings as those of the 
farmer, gardener, florist, poultryman, stock raiser, etc., is often 
doubtful, but their contributions to general or liberal education 
may be important. 

(h) Agricultural education, so called, as now carried on in 
many schools is, or can be made, a valuable factor in liberal or 
general education. Appropriate studies under this head can 
give appreciations of, and insight into, agricultural occupations 
and the importance of agriculture both as an economic pursuit 
and as a means of social development. Furthermore, the study 



Appendix B 547 

of agriculture to this end may give important vocational guid- 
ance and lead to the establishment of vocational ideals. It can 
also be made a valuable means of illustrating applications of 
various forms of science. It can, therefore, be regarded as an 
important form of liberal education. 

(c) In many cases school authorities seem as yet to make 
no clear-cut distinction between vocational agricultural educa- 
tion and agricultural instruction, which is actually non-voca- 
tional in its results, but may be made of importance in liberal 
education. As a consequence, effort in this direction is doubt- 
less frequently misdirected. 

7 (Definition). Agricultural arts education includes those 
forms of training and study based upon agricultural pursuits 
and designed to enhance general intelligence, to promote appre- 
ciation of agriculture as a form of economic activity, to show 
wherein various sciences have practical application to human 
affairs, and to give vocational guidance and to inspire voca- 
tional ideals as these relate to the field of agriculture. Agri- 
cultural arts education, therefore, constitutes an important 
division of liberal education, both in the elementary and the 
secondary field. 

8 (Definition). Vocational industrial education includes 
those forms of vocational education the direct purpose of each 
of which is to fit the individual for some industrial pursuit or 
trade. 

Among the trades and industrial pursuits enumerated by the 
United States census are those of the carpenter and joiner, 
mason (brick and stone), painter and varnisher, paper hanger, 
plasterer, plumber and steam-fitter, roofer and slater, oil-well 
worker, chemical worker, brick and tile maker, glassworker, 
marble and stone cutter, potter, fisherman, miner, baker, 
butcher, confectioner, miller, food packer, blacksmith, iron and 
steel worker, machinist, boiler maker, stove maker, tool maker, 
wheelwright, wire worker, shoemaker, harness maker, tanner, 
bottler, brewer, distiller, cabinet-maker, woodworker in general, 
brass worker, watchmaker, silver and gold worker, tinplate 
worker, bookbinder, box maker, engraver, paper-mill operative, 
printer, lithographer, dyer, cotton-mill operative, knitting-mill 



548 Appendix B 

operative, silk-mill operative, woolen-mill operative, dress- 
maker, hat maker, milliner, seamstress, shirt maker, tailor, 
broom and brush maker, charcoal burner, steam engineer, fire- 
man, photographer, tobacco operative, upholsterer. 

{a) For many of the foregoing vocations no systematic vo- 
cational education at present exists, either in schools or under 
non-school agencies. 

Among the industrial occupations for which neither organ- 
ized apprenticeship nor vocational schools as yet offer training 
are mill operatives (in general), food packers, box makers, 
general woodworkers, shoemakers (in factories), general iron 
and steel workers, etc. 

(h) For a number of the foregoing occupations wherein 
skill is required, the chief form of training available at the 
present time is apprenticeship, of a more or less organized char- 
acter. 

The large majority of persons following such pursuits as 
those of carpenter, plasterer, plumber, stone cutter, machinist, 
etc., are still trained through the agency of apprenticeship. 

(c) For some of the foregoing occupations, well-organized 
vocational schools (generally called trade schools), supported 
either privately or publicly, are available in various parts of 
the country, ahhough the total number of workers trained by 
them constitutes, as yet, but a small proportion of those re- 
quired by the industry. 

Among the occupations for which definitely organized vo- 
cational schools, giving either complete training or partial train- 
ing adjusted to the practice obtained in the industry, are these : 
Carpenter, house painter, plumber, machinist, bricklayer, cab- 
inet maker, pattern maker, sheet metal worker, bookbinder, sign 
painter, electrical worker, printer, dressmaker, milliner, etc. 

In foreign countries well-organized day or part-time voca- 
tional schools are found also for such occupations as those of 
baker, butcher, weaver, cook, teamster, lithographer. 

Some industries have organized special schools for such 
occupations as those of motorman, glove maker, photographer, 
linotype operator, telephone operator, confectioner, etc. 

{d) The term " industrial education " is frequently applied 



Appendix B 549 

to a variety of forms of practical, or apparently technical train- 
ing, based upon operations characteristic of some industries. 

Among the forms of so-called practical training to which the 
term industrial education is sometimes applied are manual 
training, sloyd, mechanical drawing, technical training, me- 
chanics arts training, printing, bookbinding, metal work, etc. 

(e) Like commercial arts education, and agricultural arts 
education described above, the really valuable objectives in " this 
industrial education " (which may properly be called " indus- 
trial arts " education) should be realized through the participa- 
tion of the pupil in the practical phases of selected processes, 
as these may be found adapted to the pupil's experience, phys- 
ical powers, etc. Practical participation in industrial arts 
processes can be supplemented by reading, visits to industrial 
establishments, experience in analyzing and assembling ma- 
chines, etc., all of which may have as a controlling purpose the 
increasing of the pupil's general intelligence, the stimulation 
of his powers of wise utilization, the laying of founda- 
tions for vocational choice, and the interpreting of contem- 
porary life. All these constitute valuable contributions to 
general education. 

9 (Definition). Industrial arts education includes those 
forms of training and study based upon industrial pursuits and 
designed to enhance general intelligence and give vocational 
guidance in the field of industrial occupations. 

(a) Reform schools for juvenile delinquents have been in 
the past, and are sometimes still, called " industrial schools." 
When these institutions ceased to be looked upon merely as 
prisons, or houses of refuge, public sentiment demanded that 
vocational training should be given in them, in view of the prob- 
able fact that neither the opportunities of apprenticeship nor 
of home vocational training would be available for these unfor- 
tunate youths. Hence, even 50 years ago a form of systematic 
vocational training was undertaken in reform schools. Prob- 
ably only a small part of this training ever actually " func- 
tioned " in vocational power, because of wrong pedagogical 
methods employed. 

10 (Definition). Vocational homemaking education in- 



550 Appendix B 

eludes those forms of vocational education the direct object of 
which is to fit for homemaking as practiced by the wife and 
mother in the home and also for some specialized forms as 
practiced by household employees, housekeepers, or other 
wage-earning assistants to the homemaker. 

A large variety of more or less unspecialized activities are 
carried on in the home. These include the preparation of 
meals, laundering, house cleaning, garment making, garment re- 
pairing, the nursing of children, minor repair work in the equip- 
ment of the home, etc. In homes conducted on a somewhat 
elaborate scale, specialized forms of service may be found, the 
workers being housekeepers, cooks, waitresses, chambermaids, 
nurses, butlers, janitors, etc. 

Among occupations which were formerly carried on in the 
home, but have been since specialized away from it, are those 
of spinning, weaving, milking, butter and cheese making, tan- 
ning, barbering, brewing, food packing, shoemaking, furniture 
making, etc. Other occupations which now seem to be in pro- 
cess of being specialized away from the home are baking, gar- 
ment making, fruit preserving, etc. 

(a) As in the case of farming, there is comparatively little 
specific vocational differentiation within the average home. 
Notwithstanding the removal from the home of many specific 
forms of productive work, homemaking remains a distinctive 
and clearly defined vocation for the wife and mother living 
under normal family relations as well as for specialist workers 
in homes and institutions. It is ordinarily a composite voca- 
tion, utilizing various forms of skill and related knowledge. 
Vocational education for homemaking must, therefore, aim to 
produce as many forms of power as the distinctive home oper- 
ations now require, each to a degree suited to the time, energy, 
and native ability of the learner. It is especially necessary that 
in the homemaker an harmonious union of various forms of 
skill and knowledge should be found. 

(&) From 60 per cent to 80 per cent of all women eventually 
become homemakers. Modern social and economic conditions 
are such that the majority of these spend the years from sub- 
stantially 16 to 20 or 25 in wage-earning pursuits (only a small 



Appendix B 551 

proportion being connected with homes), after which home- 
making is entered as a career to be followed for life, or at least 
for many years. 

(c) During recent years, many forms of education have 
been introduced into private and public schools as designed to 
minister to the development of homemaking power or apprecia- 
tion. These are variously named " household arts," " domestic 
science," "domestic arts," "household economics," "home 
economics," " domestic economy," etc. Frequently they have 
been introduced into schools as subjects of study and laboratory 
experiment on the same basis as other studies. The extent to 
which these studies " function " vocationally, if at all, for 
homemaking is yet in doubt, especially when they are followed 
only from two to five hours per week. In most instances it is 
probable that the training thus given should be regarded as 
effective rather on the side of liberal than of vocational edu- 
cation. 

{d) The study of household arts (with the aid of suitable 
textbooks, laboratory experimental work, etc.) can obviously 
be made a valuable feature of liberal education, in the sense that 
such study can improve standards of utilization and develop 
larger ideals of home life. Women exert an exceptionally 
large influence on standards of consumption in the fields of 
artistic products, economic utilities, and specialized service. 
For this reason, it is especially important that as a phase of their 
general education they should be instructed and trained as to 
most effective standards of utilization. 

11 (Definition). Household arts education includes all 
those forms of instruction and training based upon the occupa- 
tions of the home or household, and which are designed to pro- 
mote higher standards of appreciation and utilization in the 
field of the activities associated with homemaking, to promote 
right conceptions of the social importance of the home as a 
nursery of childhood and a haven for the wage-earners of the 
family, and to show wherein the various arts and sciences have 
practical application in domestic life. Hence, household arts 
education can be made a large factor in the liberal education of 
womanhood. 



552 Appendix B 

12 (Definition). Nautical education is the term used to 
designate those forms of vocational education, the controlling 
purpose of each of which is to train youths for such occupations 
as those of the fisherman, the sailor, the ship captain, and the 
like. These forms of training have not yet been clearly differ- 
entiated in the educational practice of America. A few spe- 
cial nautical schools of a technical character exist, and in the 
United States naval service facilities for training seamen are 
provided. 

///. Pedagogical Phases of Vocational Education 

1. Major and minor phases. — ^Vocational education, as re- 
spects its organization for teaching purposes, presents in almost 
every instance two quite distinct major phases and one minor 
phase; namely, the concrete, practical, or manipulative major 
phase; the technical or theoretical major phase, the subjects 
of study under the latter head being sometimes referred to as 
the " related subjects " ; and a third relatively minor phase 
embracing those studies and practices designed to promote 
vocational ideals, general insight, and other knowledge and ap- 
preciation which are pertinent, but not directly necessary for 
the particular vocation for which training is being given. 

In the training of the dentist there is required: (a) Practical 
work in filling, etc. ; (6) theoretical study of anatomy, etc. ; and 
(c) possibly some study of the history of dentistry, of the 
practice of dentistry in other countries, of the need on the part 
of the dentist of offsetting the strains of his calling by suitable 
exercises for the sake of his own health, etc. In the training of 
the teacher there is required: (a) Practice in teaching; (&) 
the study, from the standpoint of the teacher, of the subjects 
which she will expect to teach, as well as methods of teaching, 
school hygiene, etc.; and (c) the history of educational admin- 
istration, the lives of noted educators, etc. In the training of 
the machinist is required: (a) A large amount of practical ma- 
nipulative work in constructing valuable objects from steel or 
iron; {h) study of such phases of mathematics, drawing, 
mechanics, etc., as apply to the practice of the machinist; and 



Appendix B 553 

(c) possibly some study of the history of the evolution of the 
iron and steel industries, of the distribution of these industries 
in various countries, of special hygiene for metal workers, etc. 

(a) The foregoing are the phases of a program of system- 
atic vocational education. It is recognized, of course, that a 
program of liberal or general education may be carried on side 
by side with a program of vocational education. A student 
might give half his day to vocational education and the other 
half to liberal education ; or he might give one week to the 
one and another week to the other. A more common arrange- 
ment is to have the student give the best part of his working 
day to vocational education, with provision made for some cul- 
tural or civic studies, exercises, or participation, in marginal 
time. For example, the Massachusetts program permits from 
10 per cent to 20 per cent of the day to be given to cultural 
training. This may be in English literature, music, or other 
lines of interest and importance. 

(b) The problem of the proper combination of general with 
vocational education is one to be determined on the basis of aims 
and the requirements of efficient practice in each field, taking 
due account of the economic necessities of the learner. It is 
contended in some quarters that, if general or liberal education 
be blended with vocational, neither form becomes efficient. 
The question as to how far the two forms may be adjusted 
within a given day or other period efficiently must be deter- 
mined by the experiment. 

2 (Definition). Basic vocational education includes both 
major and minor phases, all so codrdinated as to produce a 
desired total of vocational competency. 

Extension vocational education is frankly one phase only, 
based upon the assumption of the competency of experience in 
productive work or training under other agencies to give other 
phases. 

Technical instruction can be properly designated as voca- 
tional (for one phase) when it can be shown that for a sub- 
stantial proportion taking it, valuable vocational powers are an 
outcome. 

Few examples of genuinely basic vocational education in 



554 Appendix B 

schools are yet available. The best schools of medicine, ele- 
mentary school teaching, and stenography give nearest ap- 
proximations. 

3 (Definition). The concrete, practical, or manipulative 
phase of vocational education in any occupational field in- 
cludes all phases of learning through actual and direct partici- 
pation in the practical processes characteristic of the vocation 
itself. 

The following are examples: The prospective physician ob- 
tains concrete training through his hospital service, the teacher 
in his practice teaching, the engineer in actual field work, the 
journalist by serving as reporter, etc. Persons preparing for 
the commercial callings are expected to receive concrete or 
practical training through typewriting and stenography of a 
presumably practical nature made a part of the course of in- 
struction through various types of exercises in salesmanship, 
the undertaking of practical work in accounting, etc. Manip- 
ulative or concrete work in agriculture as a means of training 
is provided through having the learners actually engage in the 
raising of crops, on a large or small scale, participation in har- 
vesting and other practical work during summers and vacations, 
the care of domestic animals as a part of the animal husbandry 
course, etc. In various forms of vocational industrial educa- 
tion, practical work is provided through having prospective 
machinists manufacture parts of the equipment of the school, 
through the manufacture of salable products, etc. ; prospective 
dressmakers spend a part of their time in making a salable prod- 
uct, etc. Practical or manipulative work in homemaking in- 
volves the preparation of meals, the actual making and repair 
of garments, the care of children, etc. 

Concrete, practical, or manipulative work in vocational edu- 
cation may be (a) on a non-productive or (b) on a productive 
basis. Productive manipulative work may involve no compen- 
sation to the student worker or regular compensation to him. 
In general, modern pedagogical theory favors productive work 
as against non-productive work, where practicable. The dis- 
tinction is this : Non-productive work is not commercially profit- 
able; when the pupil is through, his product is laid aside or 



Appendix B 555 

destroyed. Productive work is commercially profitable. Its 
results are used to increase the equipment of the school itself, 
to render service in the schools of the local communitv, or to be 
sold. Again, students who do productive work which is used 
in the school or sold may not be compensated for the same on 
the ground that it is their partial contribution toward the cost 
of their education, or they may receive a small wage for the 
same. Pedagogical theory favors the latter plan, where prac- 
ticable, because of the greater interest evoked and because the 
environment produced is similar to that in which the pupil will 
later follow his vocation. 

4 (Definition). Productive practical work includes all 
forms of practical work as a part of vocational education, the 
material results of which are of evident value to society. 

The services of internes in hospitals, of prospective teachers 
in training schools, of boys doing their productive work on a 
home farm, of shopworkers in city schools doing repair work 
on school buildings, of homemaking pupils taking charge of the 
preparation of meals for schools, etc., all represent forms of 
productive practical work. 

5 (Definition). Non-productive practical work includes all 
practical work as a part of vocational training the output of 
which can be put into no practical use. 

Examples : Business college students keeping books, doing 
typewriting, etc., of a non-marketable character; agricultural 
school students raising products which are not marketed or con- 
sumed; engineering students making extensive surveys the 
results of which are of no commercial value; shop students 
constructing articles that are simply kept for exhibit or de- 
stroyed, etc. 

{a) Vocational education in the past was carried on largely 
in shops, and through other commercial vocational agencies, 
under a more or less organized system of apprenticeship. The 
pupil learned almost exclusively through actual participation in 
concrete work. His tasks were sometimes graduated as to 
difficulty, either by chance or design. The pupil learned 
mainly through imitation, his superior sometimes showing him 
the ''tricks " and various devices. Vocational education under 



556 Appendix B 

apprenticeship is usually more effective on its practical than 
on its technical side. 

Many examples still survive of learning through apprentice- 
ship. A locomotive engineer obtains his training first as a 
fireman. A nurse frequently obtains all of her training 
through actual nursing in a hospital. Until very recently, 
many teachers in England obtained their training solely as 
apprentices, being known as " pupil teachers." In many skilled 
trades, organized apprenticeship still survives, in one form or 
another. Leadership in many vocational fields is reached 
through promotion from the lower stages — essentially a 
method of learning through actual participation which is with- 
out the direction characteristic of apprenticeship. 

(b) Because recognition of the value of actual participation 
in concrete work took place early in the development of voca- 
tional education in schools, endeavors have frequently been 
made to employ substitutes for participation in the actual pro- 
cesses themselves where participation in the commercial occu- 
pations is difficult or impracticable. This may be called prac- 
tical work on an " exercise " basis. 

The following are examples : The law student practices in 
a moot court. The engineering student carries on surveys 
around the campus. Commercial schools devise imitation 
money, set up receiving windows, etc., and carry on " make-be- 
lieve " business having some semblance to actual business. The 
agricultural student is given small plats on which to raise plants, 
or he shares in a form of " group " or " gang " labor directed 
by some teacher. The wood-working student is given exercises 
on lathes and other machines, the products of such exercises 
having no commercial value. 

(c) Several problems are still unsolved as regards concrete 
work in many lines of vocational training. Can commercially 
practical work be presented in properly graduated stages? 
What shall be the unit, or project, in the practical work? Can 
practical work in a school take the place at all of practical work 
under commercial conditions apart from the school? Is it 
economically desirable that the practical work of a school be 
sold in open market? Shall the pupil be compensated for his 



Appendix B 557 

practical work? How shall the practical work be related to 
necessary technical training? How far shall the student be 
permitted to subdivide his practical work in the direction of 
becoming a specialist, as in machine-shop working, textile 
working, etc.? 

6 (Definition). Apprenticeship is a term here used to in- 
clude all forms of systematic vocational education through the 
participation of the learner, under the direction of skilled work- 
ers in the actual work of various productive occupations. 

Well-known examples are the apprenticeship arrangements in 
the various skilled trades. Other examples, not always in- 
cluded under the term, are the " pupil-teacher system," for- 
merly prevalent in England, the training of nurses in hospital 
practice, the training of commercial experts in commercial 
houses through systematic advancement from one type of em- 
ployment to another, the methods employed in the Middle Ages 
of training knights and priests, the methods formerly prevalent 
by which physicians, lawyers, etc., first took service as youths 
under older practitioners, etc. 

Apprenticeship as a means of vocational education is gen- 
erally believed by students to be declining in possibilities and 
importance. It has almost disappeared in all the professions 
except nursing, acting, and journalism. In the industries the 
substitution of manufacturing processes for crafts production, 
and the subdivision of work made possible, has greatly dimin- 
ished the field for apprenticeship training. In occupations 
calling for increased amounts of technical knowledge (various 
electrical trades, plumbing, gardening, etc.) the methods of 
apprenticeship prove unequal to the task of giving, in satisfac- 
tory form, technical instruction. Evening vocational schools 
were first organized to compensate for this deficiency. 

7 (Definition). Technical, theoretical, or ''related sub- 
ject " phases of vocational education include those readings, 
lectures, and studies and exercises in mathematics, science, 
drawing and art, laboratory experimentation, etc., which furnish 
organized knowledge of, and practical insight into, the so-called 
" technical aspects " of vocations. The technical studies ap- 
propriate to any vocation can only be determined by a study 
of the requirements of that vocation itself. 



558 Appendix B 

The following are examples of the technical knowledge re- 
quired in certain vocations : For the physician, physiology, 
special phases of chemistry, materia medica, etc. ; for the elec- 
trical engineer, certain phases of applied mathematics, drawing, 
the principles of electricity, some of the principles of mechanics, 
etc. ; for the farmer, agricultural science, embodying selected 
phases of botany, soil physics, chemistry of fertilizers, hygiene 
of domestic animals, meteorology, accounting, exchange forms 
of mechanics as applied in farm machines, etc. ; for the book- 
keeper, some phases of mathematics ; for the house carpenter, 
certain phases of drawing, mechanics, building materials, and 
mathematical calculations; for a teamster, local geography, 
mechanics of vehicles, hygiene of domestic animals, etc. ; for 
the dressmaker, certain phases of art, drawing, mechanics, etc. ; 
for the homemaker, specific phases of food chemistry, decora- 
tive art, simple forms of mechanism, etc. 

(fl) With regard to the great majority of vocations, no sat- 
isfactory analysis has yet been made of the related technical 
studies which are pertinent and valuable. But it has become 
evident that the content of technical training which actually 
functions in many vocations is much less than has been as- 
sumed. The inherited traditions of academic education have 
caused many people to believe that all of the phases or parts 
under a given inclusive subject should be studied, notwith- 
standing the absurdities to which this contention leads. For 
example, botany and chemistry as separate abstract subjects 
are sometimes taught in agricultural schools; prospective 
mechanics are induced to study algebra and geometry; and a 
prospective house carpenter is urged to take a general course in 
mechanical drawing, although, in each case, the successful 
workers in these fields will employ only very limited and special 
phases of these subjects. It is obvious that progress in the 
development of programs of vocational education will involve 
a clear differentiation of the technical training needed in each 
vocation. Experience will probably show that so-called " foun- 
dations " in general knowledge of abstract scientific, or mathe- 
matical, or art subjects, are often relatively valueless for 
vocational purposes. 



Appendix B 559 

{h) In some discussions of vocational education the related 
technical studies are sometimes called the " academic subjects." 
This usage is confusing, and should be discouraged. The word 
" academic " should be restricted to the field of general, or 
liberal, education. 

8 (Definition). A technical school is a school designed to 
give technical knowledge only, as that is involved in some recog- 
nized vocation or group of related vocations. 

The following are examples : Schools of law and medicine 
originally taught only the more theoretical phases of these pro- 
fessions. Only in the more recent stages of their development 
are they introducing practical work also as a means of instruc- 
tion. Schools of engineering originally taught chiefly engi- 
neering mathematics, drawing, science, etc., giving little or no 
practical work. Some schools of technology still confine them- 
selves to this; but in many others shopwork, summer-camp 
work, compulsory practical service in mines, etc., are now 
added, to give necessary practical experience. The earlier agri- 
cultural colleges and schools taught primarily the mathematics 
and sciences supposed to constitute a basis of knowledge for 
agricultural practice. Some commercial schools ofTer only in- 
formational studies regarding commercial operations. Tech- 
nical high schools teach chiefly certain phases of applied science 
and art, illustrated with laboratory practice. Much of the home- 
making taught in contemporary high and other schools, under 
such heads as " household arts," " domestic economy," " house- 
hold economics," etc., is primarily an attempt to give technical 
knowledge only of the processes involved in homemaking. 

{a) Technical education had its origin and took its shape 
primarily through the attempts of society to supplement ap- 
prenticeship as a means of vocational training, the apprentice- 
ship giving practical experience, but not related technical 
knowledge. Evening vocational schools, as well as day schools, 
came into existence, first, to give related technical knowledge. 

The first medical colleges, as well as other professional 
schools, in many instances assumed that the student had already 
served an apprenticeship as an assistant to a practitioner. 

(&) The value of technical education when administered 



560 Appendix B 

without connection with practical training must be considered 
solely with reference to its actual efficiency in contributing to 
a complete scheme of vocational education. In some of the 
higher fields, as engineering, technical knowledge alone may 
constitute a very valuable foundation, whereas, in many of the 
trades, it may, if unaccompanied by practical experience, be 
almost valueless. The entire matter is one requiring further 
scientific study. 

(c) Secondary technical schools as now found in the in- 
dustrial, agricultural, and commercial fields can only occasion- 
ally be called " vocational schools " in the sense used here, be- 
cause the instruction in them is not adjusted to the require- 
ments of a distinctive vocation. Commonly their teaching is 
of a general nature, unrelated to the actual requirements of 
callings as now organized. It is probable that their teaching 
does not generally " function " in direct vocational power. In 
a few cases the effects of the training given may be vocational, 
as in the case of draftsmen and analytical chemists. 

{d) Technical schools sometimes oflfer studies the actual 
value of which may consist in the establishing of ideals and 
appreciations. A normal school, for example, may offer the 
history of education, which is not properly a technical study, 
but the study of which may give rise to ideals of teaching. 
Such a study properly belongs under the head of " General 
vocational studies." 

9 (Definition). General vocational studies are those 
which, when considered with reference to a particular calling, 
seem to lead to the development of ideals, general interest, and 
social insight, but without contributing to specific forms of use- 
ful knowledge, skill, or power. 

The following are examples : The physician may study the 
history of medicine or the hospital practices of the past, or he 
may read the biographies of such men as Jenner, Pasteur, and 
Lister. The engineer may study economics and the rise of 
modern industry, labor problems, and geological science. The 
teacher may study general psychology and the history of edu- 
cation. The prospective machinist may study the general lit- 
erature of his subject, the history of the evolution of steel 



Appendix B 561 

working, industrial hygiene as related to his calling, etc. The 
prospective clerk may study commercial geography, the history 
of exchange, and modern banking problems. The prospective 
homemaker may read of the homes of the past or of the pres- 
ent in other lands, etc. 

(a) It is obvious that in and about any particular calling a 
large amount of literature may be gathered which, properly 
used, should do much to promote ideals, to give insight into 
the social relationships of the calling, to develop an apprecia- 
tion of its hygienic and psychological aspects, and to lay the 
foundations for an appreciation of the possibilities of advance- 
ment for the worker. 

{h) The actual value of so-called general vocational educa- 
tion is still open to question. It is exceedingly easy to organize 
and administer various forms of " general vocational " educa- 
tion in accordance with academic traditions. It may lead to 
" industrial intelligence," a quality which, if it exists as ordi- 
narily conceived, is much in demand. It is probable that the 
actual value of general vocational education is very dependent 
upon the degree to which it has been preceded by foundations 
in practical experience and definitely related technical studies. 

IV. Pedagogical Devices in Vocational Education 

Vocational education requires the development of new and 
sometimes unfamiliar pedagogical devices, most important of 
which, for the present, are those signified by the terms " proj- 
ects," " short unit course," " correlation of technical and practi- 
cal training," and " productive work." 

1 (Definition). A project in vocational education is a 
definite unit of instruction which combines practical or manip- 
ulative achievement with a definite enhancement of power to 
apply related technical knowledge. 

(a) Practical work alone may correspond to what is known 
as a " job " in many lines of industry. A project is an *' edu- 
cational " job; it has educational value, and it ought to have 
economic value. 

{h) Growth in capacity to apply related technical knowledge 
2o 



562 Appendix B 

may involve application of general knowledge already obtained, 
as where a student in carpentry learns to make further use of 
his previously acquired knowledge of board measure ; or it may 
involve the acquisition of new technical knowledge, as that is 
immediately related to the job in hand. 

(c) A complete project usually involves the following steps 
on the part of the learner : 

1. Purposeful consideration of the conditions to be met in 
undertaking the job. 

2. Planning how to meet these conditions, in terms of the 
materials of the trade, trade operations, suitable tools, etc. 

3. Preparation of needed preliminary working aids in con- 
ventional forms, such as drawings, working plans, etc. 

4. The performing of such calculations as may be necessary, 
including figuring cost, ascertaining amount of stock to be 
used, and other conditions. 

5. The execution of the job as planned, and in accordance 
with specifications. 

6. The submission of a proper report of the job. 

7. In some cases, a disposal of the project on an economic 
basis. 

The following are examples of projects : An engineering stu- 
dent employed to lay out a grade as required by a railroad ; a 
hospital interne given charge of a case; a teacher taking full 
charge of a group of pupils ; an agricultural student undertak- 
ing to raise an acre of corn, and to market the same, or to take 
charge of two dairy cows for a year, including the proper care, 
feeding, and milking of these; an industrial-school student 
undertaking a definite job of work as this is carried on in com- 
mercial enterprises; a pupil in a trade school making a dress, 
or a group of pupils in a school of carpentry erecting a cottage ; 
a student in homemaking preparing the family breakfasts for a 
month, etc. 

(d) Projects may be subdivided into major and minor proj- 
ects, the latter being subdivisions of major projects. 

For example, a boy in an agricultural school might undertake 
to raise an acre of potatoes, this being his major project. For 
practical purposes, he would subdivide this into a series of 



Appendix B 563 

minor projects, each one a unit in itself. A class of pupils in 
an industrial school might undertake the construction of a 
machine, each boy having some one piece of work assigned to 
him as his minor project, or even some one operation. A girl 
undertaking the preparation of the family breakfasts for a 
month might make her minor project temporarily the study 
and practice required in preparation of one dish. 

(e) It is obvious that projects may be individual or coop- 
erative. It is conceivable that in industrial schools, large 
cooperative projects might be undertaken by a class, with 
appropriate subdivisions, each subdivision forming a project 
by itself. 

(/) The project has no definite counterpart in academic or 
general education. Much of the work in general education was 
formerly organized on the " lesson unit " basis. In such sub- 
jects as mathematics, history, geography, English, it is now 
organized on the " topic unit " basis. The study of a classic 
selection in a foreign language, and the execution of a manual 
training enterprise provide the nearest analogies. 

(g) The alternative to the project organization of voca- 
tional work is, on the one hand, the job as the unit of practical 
work, and, on the other, the logically organized course of in- 
struction in technical subjects. 

(h) In many lines of vocational education, satisfactory 
series of projects have not yet been developed. Obviously, the 
development of a project system of organizing vocational work 
presents very great difficulties, and especially to persons pre- 
possessed in favor of the logical organization of technical sub- 
ject matter. 

2 (Definition). The short unit course is an intensive form 
of training and instruction which is intended to meet, in a lim- 
ited number of lessons, a specific need of a particular group of 
learners. Each unit deals with some one teachable phase of 
a trade or other occupation, and is complete in itself. 

The short unit course has thus far been worked out primarily 
only in the fields of agricultural, industrial, and homemaking 
education. In agriculture, short unit courses are found in con- 
nection with extension work, where, in the course of a week or a 



564 Appendix B 

few weeks definite instruction is given in both the manipulative 
and technical phases of some one specific field of practice in 
agriculture or animal husbandry. In evening industrial schools 
the short unit course is designed to give quite specific instruc- 
tion, either of a manipulative or technical character, in some 
one phase of the trade or occupation being followed, or to be 
followed. It is assumed that the short unit course, when tech- 
nical in character, will be related to the practical work already 
being followed by the learner. 

The following are examples : Five lessons in the use of 
spraying ; 5 lessons in orchard cropping ; 5 lessons in farm ac- 
counting; 5 lessons in grafting; 10 lessons in kiln drying of 
lumber; 10 lessons in the use of the buzz planer; 5 lessons in 
the use of the sliding rule ; 6 lessons in thread cutting ; 20 les- 
sons in cotton sampling; 5 lessons in the making of a shirt 
waist. 

3 (Definition). The correlation of technical studies and 
practical work includes such pedagogical devices as involve the 
integral relation of technical studies with jobs of practical work 
as found in the project method of organization. 

The following are examples : Mechanical drawing may be 
taught as a general subject, apart from its particular applica- 
tion to the work of the machinist, house carpenter, or dress- 
maker (probably general, or general technical, rather than vo- 
cational) ; or, as opposed to this, it may be taught in intimate 
correlation with the practical work of training for various 
specific vocations. A pupil studying house carpentry may ac- 
quire power in mechanical drawing through exercises closely 
adjusted to the practical work which he is taking from day to 
day. Difi^erent forms of drawing would therefore be required 
for the machinist, the plumber, the electrician, etc. 

Such sciences as botany and zoology may be studied by a 
prospective farmer, independent of their particular applica- 
tions in agriculture (therefore general education). As op- 
posed to this, the student of agriculture may undertake to raise 
an acre of potatoes, and in conjunction with this problem study 
those phases of plant and animal life which are essential to the 
success of his enterprise. 



Appendix B 565 

A girl may study the mechanical principles of movement of 
air currents as a matter of physics (general). As opposed to 
this, she may be instructed in the practical problems of making 
various types of stoves burn effectively, and in conjunction 
with this problem such matters relating to the circulation of 
air currents in stoves as will reinforce her practical experience. 

In view of academic traditions, it is not difficult to teach 
various sciences, as well as mathematics and drawing, as sepa- 
rate abstract subjects. It is now generally believed that for most 
pupils, at least, the learning of these subjects in the abstract 
does not contribute to efficient vocational training. On the 
other hand, the integral correlation of phases of these techni- 
cal studies with practical work presents obvious pedagogical 
difficulties, but its vocational value is unquestioned. 

V. Types of Schools for Vocational Education 

1. Vocational schools classified. — Vocational education in 
schools, like other forms of education, may be carried on in day 
schools (in which the student is under the control of the school 
for substantially all of his working time) ; evening schools (in 
which the student is regularly employed, and is under direction 
of the school only for his evening hours) ; or continuation 
schools (in which the student is regularly employed, and is un- 
der control of the school only for a limited number of hours 
taken from his working day). 

These schools may be further classified as follows : 

Day vocational schools : 

(a) Unified, or combined. 

(b) Dual, or cooperative — 

(1) Full responsibility. 

(2) Part responsibility. 
Evening vocational schools : 

(a) Preparatory. 

(b) Extension. 
Continuation vocational schools : 

(a) Preparatory. 

(b) Extension. 



566 Appendix B 

2 (Definition). A day school for vocational education is 

one which requires that the pupil be under the direction of the 
school for substantially the greater part of each working day, 
for at least five days in each week, for the major portion of 
each year. 

Day vocational schools are of several types, according as 
the practical or productive work in them is done under the same 
roof and in direct relation to the technical instruction, or sep- 
arately from it. Among these are the " unified " or " com- 
bined " type, and the " dual " or " cooperative " type. 

3 (Definition). A day vocational school of the unified or 
combined type is one in which all phases of a complete (or 
basic) program of vocational education are carried on under 
one roof, or general building, under the immediate control and 
direction of the school. 

The following are examples of unified, or combined, day vo- 
cational schools : A medical college immediately controlling its 
own hospital, and opportunities for clinical and practical work ; 
an engineering college possessing its own shops, summer camps, 
mines, etc., for experimental and practical work; an agricul- 
tural school owning its own farms, gardens, and live stock; a 
commercial school with differentiated opportunities for various 
forms of practical work in accounting, typewriting, salesman- 
ship, etc. ; an industrial school having its own productive shops 
and other facilities for constructive work; a homemaking 
school owning a house or apartment in which practical house- 
keeping is carried on, including such branches as cooking, sew- 
ing, laundering, care of rooms, nursing, etc. 

It is a present tendency in vocational education to insist that 
the practical work given in training shall be of a productive, 
commercially profitable, and marketable character. Hence, we 
have instances of medical colleges managing serviceable hos- 
pitals; normal schools using as practice schools public schools 
in the community ; schools of carpentry leasing or buying land, 
erecting buildings, and selling the same; dressmaking schools 
marketing their product ; electrical workers' schools doing neces- 
sary labor about school buildings; printing schools taking or- 
ders on a commercial scale; homemaking schools supplying 
meals and other products for sale or use outside ; etc. 



Appendix B 567 

A few instances exist where day vocational schools have 
complete control of practical work carried on within the con- 
fines of an industrial or other establishment at some little dis- 
tance, but which is, nevertheless, completely under the control 
of the instructing force of the school. 

4 (Definition). A day vocational school is of the dual or 
cooperative type when the complete program of vocational 
training involves the cooperation or other relationship of two 
agencies, one, more specifically the school, giving technical and 
related instruction, and the other an institution or agency hav- 
ing commercial or practical ends in view, but placed in a coop- 
erative relationship as a means of furnishing opportunities for 
practical experience to properly prepare pupils. 

The dual, or cooperative, day vocational school is of two dis- 
tinct types, according as (a) the authorities in control of the 
school also control the adjustment and assignment of the prac- 
tical and productive work as this may be used for educational 
purposes, or (&) the control of the practical work for learners 
is independent of the school authorities. 

5 (Definition). A day vocational school of the dual or co- 
operative type is a full-responsibility school when it has the 
direction of the arrangement of practical work for learners 
when this is carried on in independent establishments. 

The following are examples of day vocational schools of the 
cooperative type having full responsibility: A medical college 
sending its students into hospital practice in a hospital under 
other management, but with arrangements whereby the work 
done by the students shall be completely under the direction of 
the college authorities ; a normal school sending its students into 
the public schools of a local community, the students remain- 
ing completely under the direction of the normal school author- 
ities ; a group of engineering students taking a job of practical 
work, to be carried out wholly under the direction of the college 
authorities ; an industrial school sending a group of boys into an 
industrial establishment, where equipment and space are placed 
at their disposal for carrying out productive work, the actual 
program of such work being under the direction of the school 
authorities; an agricultural school, the pupils in which carry 



568 Appendix B 

on, on their home farms, practical productive work under the 
complete direction of the school. 

6 (Definition). A day vocational school of the dual or co- 
operative type is a part-responsibility school when the actual 
work of students sent into other establishments for purposes 
of practical training is controlled by, and largely under, the 
direction of the industrial establishment itself. 

The following are examples of the dual or cooperative type 
having part responsibility : A normal school sending its students 
into public schools where these students are not under the con- 
trol of the normal school, for the sake of practical experience ; 
an engineering school arranging that its students shall have op- 
portunities for practical work on railroads, in mines, and else- 
where, in the capacity of assistants or laborers ; a commercial 
school sending its students into offi,ces or mercantile establish- 
ments during busy seasons or at other times, for practical ex- 
perience; an industrial school arranging the group of its stu- 
dents who shall, during alternate weeks, or at other regular 
intervals, work as apprentices, assistants, or laborers in indus- 
trial establishments ; an agricultural school sending its pupils 
out on farms for practical experience, or in cooperation with 
parents or others in carrying out practical processes on the 
farm; a homemaking school sending its pupils into their own 
homes to carry on the home processes, subject to the require- 
ments of the home itself. 

(a) The day vocational school of the cooperative " part re- 
sponsibility " type must not be confused with the " part-time " 
school, which receives pupils from industrial establishments 
where they are already employed. (This type of school will 
later be defined as a modified form of continuation school.) 
At times the actual distinctions in character between the oper- 
ations of the two schools may be difficult to define; but the 
essential difference is determined by the fact that in one type 
the pupils go from the school to the employing establishment 
with a view to obtaining practical experience, whereas in the 
other type the pupils go from the employing establishment to 
the schools for the purpose of obtaining supplemental train- 
ing. The latter is properly " trade-extension training," dis- 
cussed under continuation education. 



Appendix B 569 

(b) The efficiency of any form of dual or cooperative vo- 
cational education depends upon the degree to which the prac- 
tical experience obtained in the shop and the technical instruc- 
tion obtained in the school are coordinated, correlated, and in- 
tegrated. In some existing so-called part-time plans the prac- 
tical work of the pupil is only remotely related to the technical 
instruction. Such an arrangement results in poor vocational 
education. An agricultural student spending his summers on 
a farm will obtain valuable practical experience, but much of 
it, being unrelated to his school work, will not constitute a 
valuable part of vocational education. Technical instruction 
in homemaking, without practical experience under the direc- 
tion of the school, is but poorly supplemented by the miscel- 
laneous practical experience obtained at home. To send a 
commercial pupil into an office or mercantile establishment dur- 
ing a busy season is much better than no practical experience 
during the course of school training; but such practical expe- 
rience will be related only remotely to the concrete teaching. 
Normal schools find the practice of sending students into 
schools not under their direct control of doubtful value, and in 
any case helpful only in the last stages of their vocational train- 
ing. 

(c) Theoretically, vocational training under cooperative or 
dual arrangements should ultimately prove the most effective, 
if proper coordination of the separate agencies can be procured, 
because then the required practical experience is obtained un- 
der genuinely commercial conditions, a situation most difficult 
to develop in a unified day vocational school. Satisfactory co- 
ordination of effort between school and commercial establish- 
ment for dual or cooperative vocational training is now difficult 
to obtain, partly (a) because commercial and industrial estab- 
lishments conducted for profit are indisposed to advance learn- 
ers through successive stages of practical work, and (b) be- 
cause teachers of technical studies are indisposed or unable to 
adjust technical instruction to the requirements of practical 
experience, preferring to teach technical studies on some purely 
logical basis. In time the following two methods of meeting 
these difficulties may be developed: 



570 Appendix B 

(1) Vocational schools having groups of pupils in need of, 
and ready for, practical experience may offer the services of 
these to industrial establishments on suitable terms, on condi- 
tion that these pupils, under the supervision of instructors, be 
allowed to fit into practical work at such places and to such de- 
grees as will be educationally profitable, while at the same time 
involving no economic loss on the part of the employer. (This 
arrangement would be especially suited to pupils from 14 to 18 
years of age.) 

(2) Teachers of technical subjects will be required to adjust 
their instruction so that, as their students who are regularly 
employed in establishments are advanced from stage to stage 
of work, the technical teacher will adjust his training to the 
requirements of the practical work. This will usually require 
that subjects of study based upon purely logical foundations 
in technical subjects be replaced by short unit courses and 
exercises based upon the practical work of the student. 

7 (Definition). A "factory" vocational school is one 
located in some adjunct capacity to a productive enterprise al- 
ready in operation. 

Training classes in large factories, large farms, on shipboard, 
in army camps, shipyards, banks, and department stores are 
examples. 

8 (Definition). A vestibule school is a factory school de- 
signed to give preparatory training or instruction to new em- 
ployees, the latter usually being already on the pay roll. 

9 (Definition). An upgrading school is a factory school 
designed either to improve the already employed worker's pro- 
ductive powers in his present department or to prepare him 
for advancement to a better paid or otherwise more advan- 
tageous department. 

10 (Definition). Evening vocational schools are schools in 
which the hours of instruction lie outside of the customary 
working day. Evening vocational schools are of two types, 
extension and preparatory. 

11 (Definition). The extension evening vocational school 
is a school in which a young person already employed in some 
occupation receives, during evening hours, vocational education 



Appendix B 571 

in subjects closely correlated with the work which he follows 
during the day, and calculated to assist him toward greater 
efficiency or more advanced work in that calling. 

The following are examples: A young man following the 
trade of machinist, receiving an evening-school training in 
mechanical drawing and calculations related to his work, or 
practical instruction on machines closely related to those he 
operates during the day, or calculated to give him more tech- 
nical knowledge of them; a man already engaged in raising 
poultry, obtaining in night classes technical instruction in the 
more scientific phases of poultry raising ; a man engaged during 
the day in the practice of medicine, law, or engineering, study- 
ing in an appropriate evening school subjects related to his pro- 
fessional work ; a domestic employed in a home, studying more 
advanced phases of cooking and sewing, in evening classes. 

12 (Definition). Preparatory evening vocational schools 
are those in which is offered vocational training unrelated to 
the occupation followed by the student during the day. 

Few satisfactory examples are yet available as to profitable 
evening preparatory vocational education. The time is usually 
too short, the student too tired or uninterested, to make satis- 
factory progress. The following examples are suggested : 
Girls in textile mills studying homemaking, the latter work be- 
ing divided into short units, such as shirt-waist making, the 
preparation of lunches, laundering, etc. (as now provided in 
special legislation in Massachusetts) ; a bookkeeper taking 
machine-shop practice, with a view to becoming a trained 
worker upon a special machine ; a clerk studying, in an evening 
law school, for the purpose of passing bar examinations. 

It is important to consider how far preparatory work in 
evening vocational schools may be developed in the future on 
what is known as the " short unit " basis. The most success- 
ful extension work in evening schools of a definitely vocational 
character is now organized on the short unit basis, which means 
that the learner is enabled to acquire skill in a particular pro- 
cess, with a particular machine, or to learn how to solve certain 
problems or to use certain devices, the necessity for which ap- 
pears in connection with his daily work. It is possible that in 



572 . Appendix B 

evening trade preparatory schools similar results can be pro- 
cured by a strictly practical " short unit " organization. 

13 (Definition). Continuation vocational schools are 
schools which are attended for a limited number of hours each 
week, within the customary working day, by persons regularly 
employed. 

(a) Continuation vocational schools, like evening vocational 
schools, may be " trade extension " or " trade preparatory " 
schools. 

{h) In practice evening vocational schools are adapted to 
workers upward of 17 or 18 years of age, while continuation 
vocational schools are primarily adapted to young workers from 
14 to 18 years of age. 

14 (Definition) . Extension continuation vocational schools 
are schools giving instruction or practice directly related to the 
occupations being followed by the pupils. 

If the time given to the school is considerable — perhaps al- 
ternate days or weeks, or a half of each working day — then 
such schools are often called '' part-time schools." Many, if 
not all, of the great variety of occupations followed by young 
persons offer opportunities for supplemental or extension train- 
ing in vocational schools on the continuation basis. The fol- 
lowing are examples : A messenger boy learning the geography 
of the community in which he works in order to improve his 
efficiency as a messenger ; a machinist being taught in short 
unit courses a variety of devices and operations essential to his 
advancement or greater efficiency ; a salesgirl being taught de- 
vices of salesmanship ; a farmer being taught particular phases 
of tillage, animal husbandry, etc. 

15 (Definition). A preparatory continuation vocational 
school is one which undertakes to teach the student a new trade 
or other occupation, or to give him an essential part of the 
training required for such trade during hours in which he is 
in attendance. 

16. Modified forms of continuation vocational educa- 
tion. — Various modified forms of continuation vocational edu- 
cation exist, according to the character of the occupation fol- 
lowed and the time available for related study. 



Appendix B 573 

Part-time vocational education includes plans whereby young 
people regularly employed are released for regular periods, 
sometimes alternate weeks, in order to obtain instruction and 
practice in matters related to their occupations. Farmers dur- 
ing dull seasons attend the short courses offered under exten- 
sion agencies or in agricultural colleges. Apprentices are some- 
times sent away to other establishments for temporary employ- 
ment, primarily to learn new or related processes. Physicians 
in practice sometimes engage in hospital practice for short 
periods, in order to obtain new knowledge. In Germany and 
England the more capable workers in certain technical trades 
are sent to special schools for limited periods to acquire mastery 
of mathematical and technical processes needed in order to 
become foremen or overseers. 

" Improvement " or " general " continuation schools, not of a 
vocational character, are common in Germany and are found at 
present in two or three states of the United States. These 
aim to utilize the continuation period of instruction to further 
general education. 

VI. Administration of Vocational Education 

The administration of publicly supported vocational educa- 
tion involves the same problems as those found in the public 
control and direction of general education. The relationship 
of the administrative organization of general education to the 
administrative organization of vocational education introduces 
questions of " dual " versus " single " control. The types of 
schools and the internal organization of schools introduce prob- 
lems of differentiation of schools, and divisions and depart- 
ments within schools. 

1 (Definition). Dual administrative control of education 
exists when, either in the state or in the local community, or in 
both, the agencies for the control of vocational education are 
distinct from those for the control of general education. 

Examples : In Massachusetts for several years a commission 
on industrial education had complete authority over industrial 
schools on behalf of the state, its operations having no con- 



574 Appendix B 

nection with those of the existing state board of education. In 
a few Massachusetts communities, separate boards of trustees 
are in charge of industrial schools. 

2 (Definition). Single administrative control is found 
when vocational schools are organized and supervised by the 
same authorities as those charged with responsibility for gen- 
eral education. 

In Massachusetts at the present time, the state board of edu- 
cation exercises certain functions alike with reference to voca- 
tional and general education. In most Massachusetts com- 
munities, a local school committee, working through a superin- 
tendent of schools, is in charge of both forms. 

In practice, neither dual nor single control is found in a pure 
form. Experience shows the wisdom of arrangements whereby, 
in communities properly appreciative of vocational education, 
there shall be ultimate single control, but with a differentiation 
of specific agencies for the direction and supervision of each 
form of education. 

For example, in Massachusetts a single board of education, 
working through a commissioner, supervises on behalf of the 
state vocational education and so much of general education 
as it is authorized to supervise under the law. Under the com- 
missioner, however, is one deputy commissioner designated to 
deal with vocational education, and another deputy commis- 
sioner to deal with other forms. Wisconsin, Indiana, 
New York, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut present examples of 
more or less modified forms of control. In some instances, 
where separate local boards exist, the board for vocational 
education may be created by the board in charge of general edu- 
cation, or the two boards may have common membership. 

3 (Definition). A vocational school is an organization of 
instructors, pupils, courses, buildings, equipment, etc., devoted 
to vocational education for one or more distinct vocations. 

An analogy is found in university organization, where, under 
one general control, departments, or schools for the teaching of 
the various professions and the liberal arts exist. 

4 (Definition). A vocational department in a vocational 
school is an organization of teachers, equipment, etc., designed 
to train young people for a single recognized occupation. 



Appendix B 575 

Thus, a vocational industrial school may have departments 
for the training of plumbers, pattern makers, cabinet-makers, 
printers, etc., and experience may show that very little of the 
actual training required for these different occupations will be 
alike or in common. A vocational commercial school might 
have departments for the training of accountants, stenogra- 
phers, clerks, salesmen, etc. A department of " general instruc- 
tion " in a vocational school is an organization of teachers, 
equipment, etc., designed to give the non-vocational instruction 
required in common by several departrnents of a vocational 
school. 

5 (Definition). A division in a vocational school includes 
two or more departments dealing with related materials, and 
involving, to some extent, related processes. 

Thus in a large vocational school there might be a wood- 
woriking division embracing such departments as pattern mak- 
ing, cabinet-making, and house carpentry ; a machine-shop divi- 
sion; a printing division, etc. 

6 (Definition) . A departmental advisory committee in the 
administration of vocational education consists of two or more 
persons, preferably representing, respectively, employers and 
employees in a given vocational field, for which the department 
to which it stands in an advisory relationship is giving voca- 
tional training. 

The successful administration of vocational education under 
public control requires the active cooperation of representatives 
of the occupations for which training is being given. A useful 
means to this end, where vocational schools are under the gen- 
eral direction of the regular school authorities, is the advisory 
committee consisting, in the main, of employers and employees 
in the particular industry for which a given department is 
offering vocational training. Good administration requires 
that the advisory committee shall be brought into intimate con- 
sultative relationship to all new proposals as to standards and 
conduct of vocational training in the department concerned. 
The responsible head of the department must, in an executive 
capacity, be responsible for securing the conditions which shall 
enable the advisory committee to be active and effective. 



576 Appendix B 

VII. Practical Arts Schools, Departments, and Studies 

In private and public schools a variety of studies and prac- 
tices have developed during recent years that may be described 
collectively by the words " practical arts." Various forms of 
practical arts education are to be sharply distinguished from 
vocational education. Experience proves that practical arts 
training, of one form or another, may make valuable contribu- 
tions to general education. It is not yet evident that practical 
arts education, as ordinarily carried on, makes substantial con- 
tributions to vocational efficiency. It may be made to affect 
vocational choice and perhaps stimulate vocational ideals. 
Among the forms of practical arts education are these : 

1. Manual arts training in lower grades. — Manual train- 
ing in lower grades is that form of practical arts education in 
which boys and girls, usually during the work of the first six 
grades, have practice with a variety of exercises or projects 
resembling projects carried on in practical life. 

This manual training includes whittling, clay modeling, paper 
folding, picture mounting, needlework, weaving, and a variety 
of other constructive activities within the range of the experi- 
ence of children under 12 years of age. In this work, boys and 
girls usually do the same exercises, and these are taught by the 
regular class teacher. 

2. Manual training in upper grades and high schools. — 
Manual training in upper grades and high schools, as the term is 
now used, applies mainly to wood and metal working, including 
at times printing, bookbinding, and various forms of construc- 
tive work as arranged for boys from 12 to 16 or 18 years of 
age. The term " industrial arts " is now preferred, inasmuch 
as the words " manual training " connote theories of formal 
discipline no longer accepted. 

In this field of manual training, well-defined programs of 
bench, forge, and metal working are now found. This work is 
usually taught by departmental teachers. 

3. Household arts for upper grades and high schools. — 
Corresponding to manual training for boys from 12 to 18 years 
of age are now found in upper grades and high schools a 



Appendix B 577 

variety of practical exercises in cooking and sewing, and occa- 
sionally in other homemaking fields, designed to give girls from 
12 to 18 years of age insight and taste with regard to domestic 
operations. 

In forms slightly, if. at all, modified the same subject is called 
" home economics " and " domestic economy." Sewing and its 
allied lines are sometimes included under the term " domestic 
art," while cooking and its allied lines are sometimes called 
" domestic science." 

4. Agricultural arts education. — In some elementary and 
high schools, exercises based principally upon tillage are now 
found as constituting a phase of general education. In some 
cases home gardening, school gardening, and laboratory work 
in agricultural science are added, as well as reading exercises 
regarding live stock, etc. 

5. Commercial arts or business education. — In elementary 
and high schools a variety of studies and practical work in book- 
keeping, typewriting, commercial paper writing, and the like 
have been introduced in recent years, but no real distinctions 
between " vocational " commercial education and " general " 
vocational education have yet been made. 

6. Practical arts high schools. — Under the influence of the 
movement for manual training a variety of special forms of 
high schools have developed, each frequently with some special 
characteristics. They are variously known as " manual train- 
ing high schools," " manual arts high schools," " mechanics arts 
high schools," " technical high schools," etc. A practical arts 
high school in Boston is organized for girls' work in household 
arts exclusively. Technical or manual training high schools 
frequently have departments of household arts for girls. 

VIII. Prevocational Education 

1 (Descriptive). Within the last few years the term " pre- 
vocational education " has been introduced into educational 
literature, apparently with several meanings. 

(a) The term " prevocational education " sometimes refers 
to studies and practices which, while not constituting a specific 

2P 



578 Appendix B 

part of vocational education, nevertheless, are assumed to be a 
valuable or even essential preliminary thereto. 

In a broad sense, ability to read and write is preliminary and 
essential to almost any form of vocational pursuit under mod- 
ern conditions. Similarly, a knowledge of arithmetic is essen- 
tial as preliminary to the commercial and many other callings. 
In professional education biology and chemistry, for example, 
are frequently spoken of as '* prevocational " to the study of 
medicine ; history and economics to the study of law ; Greek and 
Latin to the study of theology; mechanical drawing and trig- 
onometry to the engineering professions, etc. Similarly, it has 
been held that manual training or sloyd (tool work with wood 
and metals) can be " prevocational " to the mechanical trades. 
Whether any particular study " functions " as prevocational 
training can, of course, be determined only by observation and 
experiment. 

(b) The term " prevocational education " at present seems 
more commonly to be used to designate programs of instruc- 
tion and training designed to assist an individual in making an 
intelligent choice of an occupation, through giving him oppor- 
tunity to participate in a series of practical experiences related 
to many vocations. 

For example, it has been asserted that manual training 
courses are, or can be made, of value in enabling a boy to 
" find himself " as regards his natural aptitudes for some one 
of the tool trades. Similarly, it has been asserted that so-called 
" commercial " studies and practices as found in public high 
schools enable the youth to '' find himself " as regards his apti- 
tudes for some commercial calling. It has been claimed that 
students taking mechanical drawing frequently discover from 
this their qualification or lack of qualification for various 
trades in which mechanical drawing applies. 

(c) The importance of prevocational education of the type 
described under (b) increases in proportion as intelligent voca- 
tional guidance develops, on the one hand, and varied opportu- 
nities for systematic vocational education are established, on 
the other. We may assume that, in time, in any urban com- 
munity a large number and variety of departments of voca- 



Appendix B 579 

tional education will be open to a youth at 14 or 16 years of age. 
It will be important that the youth choose wisely the school 
which he shall enter. It is not economical on the part of a 
vocational school to admit a considerable number of persons 
who must early be eliminated because of innate or other dis- 
qualifications for the work selected. If programs of prevoca- 
tional education can be developed which will accomplish this 
end, much good will result. 

It has been suggested, for example, that through the seventh 
and eighth grades, instead of the present somewhat rigid 
courses in manual training, there should be presented to boys 
a large variety of opportunities to participate in constructive 
and practical work along industrial, agricultural, and com- 
mercial lines. The exercises and opportunities for practical 
achievement should be related as closely as practicable to vari- 
ous occupational pursuits as now followed. Considerable op- 
portunity for election should be given, and for the early giving 
up of uncongenial forms of work. Good amateur standards 
should prevail in this work, rather than so-called " professional 
standards." The teachers should be persons possessing varied 
forms of skill and wide industrial experience, selected with a 
view to their capacity to advise boys wisely as to vocations in 
which they would probably succeed. Similarly, it is suggested 
that opportunities could be provided for girls to " find them- 
selves " in homemaking, industrial, and commercial pursuits. 

{d) The problem of the immediate future is to define the 
purposes of prevocational education, if useful purposes can be 
found, and then to adapt programs of practice and instruction 
to the realization of these ends. 

2 (Definition). Prevocational education, as the term is 
most vividly used, includes any form of education designed to 
enable a youth to discover for which one of several possible 
vocations he is best fitted by natural ability and disposition, the 
program of instruction and practice for this purpose being based 
mainly upon actual participation on the part of the learner in 
a variety of typical practical experiences derived from the occu- 
pations involved. 



580 Appendix B 

IX. Vocational Guidance 

1 (Descriptive). Vocational guidance represents an at- 
tempt (first through philanthropic initiative and support, and 
later appearing through agencies for public education) to lessen 
the misdirection of energy and general loss of effectiveness at 
present involved in the efforts of young persons, especially in 
urban centers, to find suitable employment. 

The historic agency of vocational guidance has been the 
home. Under primitive and settled conditions, the occupation 
of the child usually followed that of the father. In the modern 
urban community, the home becomes less and less adapted to 
giving effective vocational guidance. There is also available, 
now, a large amount of organized knowledge as to hygienic 
conditions surrounding any given field of work, the require- 
ments which such work makes for intelligence or special train- 
ing, etc., which can be imparted by organized effort. As con- 
ditions now exist, youths are commonly unprepared to take ad- 
vantage of the opportunities for becoming more efficient and 
for promotion. 

2 (Definition). Vocational guidance includes all system- 
atic efforts, under private or public control, and excluding the 
traditional activities of the home, the conscious and chief pur- 
pose of which is to secure the most economical and effective 
adjustment of young people to the economic employments whicl 
they can most advantageously follow. 

Examples of the various means now employed, at leasi 
occasionally, for this purpose are : (a) Selected readings givei 
under the guidance of the school, with a view to conveying in 
formation as to economic activities, the qualities demanded ir 
the various vocations, etc. ; (&) systematic reading and study o: 
specially prepared pamphlets descriptive of the opportunities 
requirements, etc., of various particular lines of employment — 
usually given under the direction of teachers; (c) individua 
or group conferences of pupils with teachers, for the purpos* 
of discussing vocational opportunities, conditions required 
etc.; (<i) systematic study of young persons from the stand 
point of their physical and intellectual make-up, with a viev 



Appendix B 581 

to advising them as to lines of employment which they can 
most effectively enter; {e) " prevocational training" (see page 
577), consisting of limited amounts of practical experience in 
connection with exercises taken from various lines of practical 
work, with a view to discovering the pupil's fitness therefor, or 
enabling him to discover his own more fundamental aptitudes 
and interest; (/) systematic study of various economic lines 
of employment, with a view to obtaining specific data to be 
used in advising young persons seeking employment; {g) 
maintenance of employment agencies for young persons in day 
or evening school, with a view to assisting them to obtain work 
in suitable occupations. 

Vocational schools in general, in more or less organized 
forms, offer vocational guidance and act in a measure as em- 
ployment agencies in placing their graduates. This is especially 
true of normal schools, industrial schools, commercial schools, 
technological institutions, and universities. 



INDEX 



Administration of vocational education, 
282-351 

Advisory committees, 298 

Age of entrance on vocations, 311 

Age of pupils for vocational schools, 310 

Agricultural competency through by-edu- 
cation, 148 

Agricultural education, 144-189; in rural 
education, 175-189; problems of, 384; 
varieties of, 149 

Agricultural vocations, importance of, 144 

Agriculture in general education, 182; in 
high schools, 150 ; in junior high schools, 
184 

Agriculture, dimensions of projects in, 187 ; 
project method of teaching, 171 ; schools 
of, 147 ; schools of, teachers for, 356 

American Federation of Labor, reference 
to, 318 

American women, probable economic future 
of, 411-454 

Apprenticeship, 9; decline of, 206; de- 
cline of, in professions, 10; for pro- 
fessions, 114; historic, 205; supple- 
mented by vocational schools, 113; 
wanting in commercial callings, 192 

Arts, practical, 455-511 

"Arts," skill in the, 112 

Automobile industry, statistics of, 53 1 

Basic vocational education, 117; defined, 

5S3 

Bibliographies, 513-514 

"Brute, The," by William Vaughn 
Moody, 221 

Business English, 196 

By-education, defined, 8; in general edu- 
cation, 80 

Capital, place of, in production, 45 
Carnegie Foundation Report on Engineer- 
ing Education, 16 
"Cold storage" education, 25 
Commercial arts, 489 



Commercial callings and apprenticeship, 

192 
Commercial courses, criticisms of, 195; 

in high schools, 193 
Commercial education, 190-203 ; con- 
structive proposals for, 199; extent of, 
190; popularity of, 191; problems of, 
382 ; specialization of, 202 
Commercial school teachers, 359 
Commercial vocations, varieties of, 197 
"Commission on the Reorganization of 

Secondary Education," 92 
Comprehensive high school, 93 
Compulsory vocational education, 67 
Continuation schools, 114, 213; adminis- 
tration of, 332 ; essential features of, 214 ; 
vocational aims in, 334 
Control of vocational education, 296 
Cooperative vocational education, 329 
Cooperative vocational schools, 567 
Correlation, problems of, 497 
Courses for vocational schools, 26 
Courses of study, differentiation of, 346 

Definition of vocational education, 534- 

581 ^ 
Definition of vocations illustrated, i 
Democracy and education, 64, 397 
Democracy and vocational education, 60 
Dewey, Dr. John, reference to, 397 
Dewey's "Democracy and Education," 

397-410 
Disposal of product, 321 
Domestic work of women, 424 
"Dual administrative control," defined, 

573 
Dual control, 301 

Eaton, Theodore H., reference to, 155 
Economic future of American women, 411- 

454 ^ 
Economic organization, 47 
Economic tendencies shown by war, 218 
Economics, fundamental problems in, 394 



583 



5^4 



Index 



Education for utilization, 84 

Education, varieties of, 30 

Educational methods, 105 

Employment legislation, 69 

Employment, state regulation of, 59 

Employer vs. employee, 59 

Engineering professions, 275 

English, commercial, 196 

"Equal pay for equal work," 435 

Evening industrial schools, 210 

Evening school instruction, improvement 

of, 211 
Extension agricultural education, 149 
Extension courses, "short unit," 211 

Factory schools, 224 

"Faculty psychology," 87 

Families, better rearing of, 427 

Families, effective, 420 

Families, restriction of size of, 428 

Farm callings, essentials in, 165 

Farmer, "all-round," 158 

Farming, general, 158 

Farming vocations, varieties of, 144 

Farm management in vocational educa- 
tion, 174 

Farm projects in agricultural arts, 482 

Farm project school, 152, 150 

Farms, increasing size of, 167 

Farm vocations refused by farmers' sons, 
169 

Federal Board's Bulletin on Homemaking, 
264 

Formal discipline, effects and theory of, 
138 

Form discipline of namual training, 465 

"Full responsibility school," defined, 567 

Gary System, 506 

General education, minimum requirements 

of, 314 ; objectives of, 75 ; origins of, 71 ; 

related to vocational competency, 72; 

relation to vocational education, 71-104 
"General" vocational education, 90, 372 
General vs. vocational educational, 44s 
Gompers, President, quoted, 318 

High school commercial courses, 193 
High schools, junior, 339 ; rural, 180 
Home economics, 231-271 
Homemaking as an exclusive vocation, 425 ; 
as a vocation, characteristics of, 237 



Homemaking education, 231-271, 453; 
by project method, 259; case method 
applied to, 247; problems of, 231; re- 
quirements analyzed, 248; Smith- 
Hughes Act, 252 

Homemaking projects, 484 

Homemaking vocations, analyzed, 239; 
sociological characteristics of, 241 

Home project earnings, 154 

Home project work in agriculture, 15Q 

Homes, how described, 234 

Household arts, 260, 267, 484 

Individual, acquired powers of, 50 
Individual, qualities of, in production, 48 
"Industrial Democracy," 102 
Industrial education, 204-230; defined, 

547 ; for trades, 208 ; problems of, 378 ; 

the war's effects on, 216 
"Industrialism," criticized, 391 
"Industrial order," present, 408 
Industrial schools, endowed, 210; evening, 

210 
Industrial school teachers, 361 ; proposed 

methods of training, 367 
Industries, scope of supervision of, 204 

"Jack-of- all-trades," 92 

Junior high schools, 339 ; aims of, 347 

Labor unions and vocational education, 
318 

Land for prospective farmers, 165 

Law as a profession, 274 

Liberal education and vocational educa- 
tion, fundamental distinctions between, 
78 

Liberal education, enrichment of, 223; 
field of, 38; sources of, 81; through 
household arts, 267 

Liberal education vs. vocational educa- 
tion, 24 

Machinery, effects of, on women's labor, 

416 
"Machine tenders," 54 
Manual training, 455 ; experiments in, 464 
Marot, Miss Helen, reference to, 389 
Marot's "Creative Impulse in Industry," 

389-397 
Mechanics Institutes capitalized, 14 
Medicine as a profession, 273 



Index 



585 



Mental discipline, illusions of, 87 

Mental training, effects of, on method, 138 

Methods of teaching, 105 

Methods, problems of, 137 

Moody, William Vaughn, quoted, 221, 

424 _ ^ 

Moral values in vocational education, 142 
Motives for vocational education, 139 
Motives from instincts, 141 

Nursing, pedagogy of, 279 

Objectives of education, distinguished, 

471 ^ 
Objectives of general education, 75 
Organization of vocational education, 

permanent types of, 307 

Pedagogy of agricultural education, 162 
Pedagogy organization of vocational edu- 
cation, 308 
Practical arts, administrative problems of, 
508; classified, 476; and vocational 
guidance, 467 ; correlation with other 
subjects, 496 ; for older pupils, 503 ; 
for young pupils, 505 ; in the Gary 
System, 506 ; in general education, 455- 
511; origins of, 457; pedagogic units 
for, 490; play motives in, 499; with- 
drawn from homes, 459; work motives 
in, 499 
Practical arts courses, evolution of, 462 
Practical arts education, defined, 539; 

aims of, 461 ; defined, 471 
Practical skill, how taught, 113 
Pre-apprenticeship, 115, 331 
Pre-vocational education, defined, 577 
Private vocational schools, 52 
Problems of agricultural education, 164 
Professional education, 6, 272-281 ; peda- 
gogy of, 277 ; problems of, 376 ; super- 
vision of, 272 
Professional schools, teachers for, 355 
Professions, varieties of, 277 
Product, disposal of, 321 ; in practical arts, 

493 ; workers' share of, 36 
Production, amateur, 494; and distribu- 
tion, 32 ; reasons for, 207 
Productive power, increase of, 36 
Productive work, 23 ; ownership of, 323 ; 
proceeds from, 323 ; retention by pupils, 
327 



Productivity, basic factors in, 43; es- 
sential factors in, 42 ; intensive vs. ex- 
tensive, 40; of the individual, 32 

Project, defined, 561 

Project method in homemaking education, 
259 

Project, the, as correlation center, 136 

Project, the, in teaching, 128 

Projects in agriculture, 482 ; in industrial 
arts, 479 ; in practical arts, 491 ; in 
vocational education, 23 ; type, in 
agriculture, 160 ; varieties of, 136 

Regulation of women's work, 419 

"Related subject," defined, 557 

Report on "Cardinal Principles of Second- 
ary Education," 92 

Rural schools, aims of, 178; and agri- 
cultural education, 175 

Rural secondary education, 180 

Rural vocational education, 185 

Salem Normal School, 359 

Schreiner, Olive, reference to, 415 

Secretary as vocation, 200 

"Short unit," extension course, 211 

"Short unit," course, defined, 563 

"Skills" in vocations, in 

Smith-Hughes Act, 18; and homemaking 

education, 252 
Social inheritance of vocations, 5 
Social inheritance, the economic, 43 
Social knowledge related to vocation, 102 
Specialization, economic, 125; in agri- 
culture, 162 ; of production, 53 ; of 
production in war-time, 218; of voca- 
tions, analyzed by Dr. Dewey, 401 
Specialized industries, education for, 222 
Speciahzed vocations, education for, 228, 

451 
"Speeding up," 55 
Standards of living, 32 
Statistics of occupations, 515-533 
Stenography as a vocation, 197 
Supply and demand, law of, 46 
Surveys for vocational education, 303 

Teachers in agricultural schools, 356; in 
commercial schools, 359; in industrial 
schools, 361 ; in professional schools, 
355 ; professional training of, 280 ; 
training of, for vocational schools, 35 a- 
368 



586 



Index 



Teaching as a profession, 272 
Teaching unit, the project as a, 128 
Teaching units, varieties of, 130 
Technical instruction in homemaking, 256 
Technical knowledge in vocations, 1 1 1 
Technical school, defined, 559 
Technical schools, 15 
Technical schools of agriculture, 149 
Terminology, 534-581 
Tests, vocational, 49 
Trade school education, 208 
Trade schools, defined, 11 
Trades in United States, 29 
Trades, the decline of, 57 ; the place of, 56 
Training of teachers of vocational schools, 
352-368 

Unit control, 301 

United States Census, reference to, 28; 

statistics from, 515-533 
Up-grading schools, 224 
Utilization, education for, 84 

Variability of workers, 4 

Vestibule schools, 224 

Vocational aims in agricultural education, 

157 

Vocational by-education, 7 

Vocational competency, factors in, 109 

Vocational diseases, 55 

Vocational education, advisory oversight 
of, 298; administration of, 282-351, 
385 ; and general education com- 
bined, 317; and labor unions, 318; 
and liberal education, fundamental 
distinctions between, 78; basic types, 
117; bibhographies of, 513-514; com- 
pulsory, 67, 336; curricula for, 26; 
cooperative, 329; defined, 31, 534-581; 
direct, 9 ; derived from vocations, 89 ; 
distinguished from general education, 
73; determination of need of, 99; for 
agriculture, 144-189; for homemaking, 
231-271; for professions, 6, 272; for 
specialized pursuits, 124; for women, 
412, 421 ; for women, conditions affect- 
ing, 447; future of, 18; hybrid forms 
of, 11; local vs. central control of, 296; 
major divisions of, 541 ; modern move- 
ment for, 16; moral values of, 142; 
in continuation schools, 213; in junior 
high schools, 339 ; in private schools, 52 ; 



in schools, origins, 13 ; in war-time, 217 ; 
partial forms of, 1 2 ; pedagogical phases 
of. 552 ; primary aims of, 35 ; public 
control of, 296 ; publicly controlled, 19 ; 
public support of, 63 ; relation to general 
education, 71-104; school areas for, 
282 ; social demands for, 31 ; some 
future problems of, 389-410; special 
problems of, 369-388 ; surveys for, 303 ; 
the project in, 132; transfer of results 
of> 373; types of, 122; undemocratic, 
60 ; imit vs. dual control, 301 ; uni- 
versality of, 34; unreal kinds, 96; un- 
specialized, 90; varieties of, 119; vs. 
civic education, 102; vs. "general" 
education, 402 ; vs. liberal education, 
24, 370 ; when genuine, 94 

Vocational guidance, defined, 580; 
through practical arts, 467 

Vocational homemaking, problems of, 244 

Vocational levels, 450 

Vocational motives, 139; for general 
education, 140 

Vocational schools, accessibility of, 20; 
age of admission to, 62 ; and organized 
labor, 294; corporation support of, 288; 
definition of classes, 565 ; for agri- 
culture, need of, 148; for professions, 
10 ; indeterminateness of, 75 ; location 
of, 285; private support of, 288; public 
support of, 292 ; specialization in, 62 ; 
supplementing apprenticeship, 113; sup- 
port of, 287 ; training of teachers for, 
352-368; types of, 119; varieties of, 22 

Vocational schools, admission standards 
for, 51 

Vocational school teaching, types of, 353 

Vocational survey, 98 

Vocational training, as vestibule to voca- 
tion, 89 

Vocational training through practice, 22 

Vocations, as social inheritance, 5 ; changes 
of age of entrance upon, 313 ; defects of, 
41 ; defined by Dr. Dewey, 400 ; edu- 
cative values, 406; general education 
needed in, 51 ; kinds of, 2 ; of women, 
domestic vs. non-domestic, 430; over- 
crowding of, 57 ; pathological con- 
ditions in, 54; physical fitness for, 48; 
shifting in, 21; statistics of, 515-533; 
varieties of, 99; variety of, in United 
States, 28 



Index 



587 



Wage-eaming, control of entrance upon, 

69 
Wage-eaming employment of women, 417 
Wages for productive work, 23 
Warren's "Farm Management," reference 

to, 147 
War's effects on industrial education, 216 
Woman, the "college," 441 



Women, as producers, 414 ; in professions, 
439 ; probable economic future of, 41 1- 
454; problems of vocational education 
for, 447; regimented labor of, 442; 
"suitable" work for, 433 

Women's entrance upon wage-eaming em- 
ployments, 417 

Workers, variability of, 4 



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